Billy Aronson on Sparking RENT and Surviving the Creative Struggle – Episode 378

Jeff Dwoskin 0:00

All right, everyone. I'm excited to introduce my next guest. Playwright and author originated the concept of the rock opera rent. He's written plays, musicals, Emmy Award winner. It's written for peg and cat backyard, again, million other shows. Author of out of my head. That is a great book, and we're going to talk a lot about that. Welcome to the show. Billy aaronson, Hey,

Billy Aronson 0:24

Jeff Dwoskin, I'm honored to be here. I'm a fan of your comedy, and I love the kind of stuff that you look at. I mean, the girl from Uncle you've had on your show, yes, from Mad Magazine and The Simpsons and Twilight Zone, all great stuff. Honored to be here.

Jeff Dwoskin 0:37

It sounds like we're gonna have a good time. We all we like all the same things. Cool, Billy, obviously this rent thing pops out, and I want to talk all about it. But you also recently wrote a book out of my head. It's when I was reading it, I was trying to think about it. Sum it up, it was like a survivor's guide. It was like, it was very honest about your journey as a playwright and and writer for children's television. What made you finally kind of put pen to paper, as they say,

Billy Aronson 1:07

Yeah, well, I found myself getting asked by lots of young people. I'll bet you have similar experiences. They want to meet with me for coffee and to get any clues or tips about how they can make a life in the arts and entertainment because their parents are telling them not to usually, or they're the relatives. It's sort of an undefined but what are you really doing, sort of thing? And it is very hard to make money nowadays in anything. It's hard being young. But I found that, as I talked about that, I was very encouraging, that I think if you have to do it, if you've got this thing inside you, that you need to express the sense of how something weird or unusual about the world, and you're willing to be patient and change your expectations as you go along, and to fail a lot in humiliating ways in front of as many people as possible. I think eventually you're going to make it. I wanted to put that down eventually into words, because all the different conversations took different aspects of what I discovered in my adventures. And this is the whole thing all put together. And yes, as you said, there's a lot of mess, there's a lot of embarrassment, depression I struggled with. I put it all in there because I never read books I find about this, about making a career in the arts usually end with this huge success, where they become a star, and I enjoy those books. They're very happy, but it didn't show what it's really like on a day to day basis. And even the people I know who are that famous, if you talk to them daily, it feels like they're a failure, or that they're struggling, or that you still get rejected every day. So I wanted to

Jeff Dwoskin 2:23

talk about that. I love it. It's a good message, because even like with stand up comedy, I would always say you never learn anything from the good shows. It's always like when you bomb and something goes wrong, that you're forced to self, reflect and pivot, and that's what drives you forward. Failure is what drives you forward, not not success.

Billy Aronson 2:44

That's all I've ever learned from I wish success could teach you something, but it's just success. You feel great about yourself, and you probably feel a little too self confident afterwards, but failure, you know, if you sit in the back of a place and watch the audience not laughing, you know when they're supposed to laugh, you really learn something from that. Or just, even just even just applying for jobs, and they don't choose you. Why are they not choosing that you learn from so you're right. I imagine, as a stand up comedy, you get it right away. You're standing up there in front of people, you're so vulnerable and, wow, I need to change this. You can feel that, and that's an education, yeah, drama school didn't give me. I mean, I there are things you can learn in graduate school, and I did it, so I have to plead guilty to that. But I began learning when I finished graduate school and came to New York and tried to survive with my art.

Jeff Dwoskin 3:29

You said, the thing inside you, what? When did you know you this thing inside you? You had to live in the world of the arts.

Billy Aronson 3:37

Well, it was sort of always there. My youngest memories, I wanted to make up plays with my brother and sister all the time. And I kind of negotiate with them to be in them. You know, I give away my my favorite rocks or something, if my little brother would stay in our production of Oliver. And I was always writing stuff down and making up songs, like I wanted to be in the monkeys. I have my own band like that. So I write entire albums of songs. Sort of was just how I saw the world. There was always something outside, like I was kind of shy. I still am, but there's always something in my mind outside, what I can share explicitly by talking to people that I wanted to share. So it had to be through what we call the arts. I mean singing. At first, it was performing, doing, playing, in plays in junior high and high school. Then I just got too scared for that. It's horrifying memorizing life, and you can't really if you don't write the play, you can't really control what you're expressing. I found myself writing plays in college. I needed to do it. Actually, there was a very specific event that caused me to write my first play. I had a girlfriend my senior year in high school. After a long time, I'm not having a girlfriend, and man, did she break my heart at the end. It just I, but it wasn't just the you. The breakup. Wasn't just a usual like, Oh, that sucks. I'm low. It was like, How can another human being mess with your head like that? And I sort of got it. Just had this feeling about what human beings can do to each other. How powerful, how wonderful. I mean, it's it was the most thrilling thing in my whole distance at 17. You know that being vulnerable for the first time? And reeled out your mind and crushed. So anyway, that made me, I couldn't I had to say something about that, or show it to be like, get it isn't that something? You know, life is weirder than we ever thought. And so it just sort of had to be a play.

Jeff Dwoskin 5:13

I noticed you've written plays, musicals, one act plays. What is, how does one set up to do just a one act play. Yeah, you know, like, what? What is all that? What does that mean? I do not. I've gone. I enjoy the theater. I've gone, but I can't pretend that I know what all these the minutia of it is. So educate me. School me.

Billy Aronson 5:33

Well, gosh, like a lot of the things in the theater and comedy, it seems to me, it's dictated by something other than your will. If something needs to be short. You shouldn't stretch it. I think that when I see plays a lot of the time, I think someone is trying to make it a full length so they can get it produced. Much easier to get a full length produced, I think, than a one act. And you certainly they can make more money. Fact is, I think most of the things, at least, that I was writing for a while, if you took out most of the words, it was better. I just like things. For me, maybe I'm too neurotic, but can't ask someone to sit still for like a second that they don't have to. They don't. I mean, there are things to do, you know, I'm not going to ask for your time so that a character can have a flowery speech that doesn't take you to the next step. And I mean that your play is to get from here to here period, get to that bang as quickly and as purely and perfectly as you can why? Googly good around all over, like a lot of plays, they have characters just start to talk. And anyway, that's my it's my taste. I guess I tend to love things like, I love pop songs. I love symphonies too. But songs can really get to you quickly. They're right to the point, you know, the verse and the chorus and the bridge, and then it's over and it's Wow. You can see the world in a slightly different way that quickly. So I guess, I guess the answer is, I like short plays. That's how I write them.

Jeff Dwoskin 6:46

Okay? So I think the name of it threw me one act, because I always thought like plays were multiple acts. So I was like, so one act play is really like a short film.

Billy Aronson 6:55

Yeah, it's shorter. Basically, it's sort of subjective. I mean, because sometimes a play can be an hour and a half without intermission. So someone might call it a one act. I guess I'm thinking of short, you know, shorter so that shorter than that what normally would be done by itself. Got

Jeff Dwoskin 7:09

it you kind of mentioned sitting in the back, yeah, one of your earlier plays. You can pick which one you want, but like when you were in the back listening to the reactions, yeah, talk me through that process. I mean, I know, like in doing comedy, you can say it and realize immediately where you have to fix it. Like, is it like, the same kind of visceral thing, like you can plan it out in your head and on paper and you can play but when it's in front of people, it's different. Everything

Billy Aronson 7:39

is different in front of people is it's like, you can plan out what you're going to say on a day. You're going to say on a date, and you get to the date, there's that line is too clever. I'm not going to say that. I'm not going to look at her eyes and say that it's stupid. You know, you gotta get yourself there. And so one example, one horrifying example for me, is my brother is mentally ill. This is true. He's schizophrenic. So I've always been interested in mental illness, and including people with different kinds of minds, like I do, just different sorts of ways of viewing things. So I made a play that was I took the great farce by Fauci George fedo, a wonderfully funny play with lots of lying and twisting, and I said it in a put it in a mental ward, where people are have all different sorts of minds. To me, it was fascinating. And we did a production of it the wool at the wooly mammoth in DC, which is a great avant garde theater, and somehow, you know, as soon as we started it dead silence. Nobody was going to laugh even gently with the characters who were mentally ill. It just felt cool. So I learned that my family came in. It was a wonderful, you know, a big deal production. Family came in the silence. Oh, Jeff, the silence. I mean, here I am. It's like, I'm making fun of my brother. Oh, God, I learned so much from that. But I will say the play was done somewhere else, and it worked. Part of it was the set. The set we had at William mammoth added to the insanity. It made it look like everything was cockeyed, and it was a scary production, whereas when they did it in Wellfleet in New England, it was gentle. And also the characters weren't wearing hospital pajamas. They were dressed like you and me. So they were just you and me, so they were just neurotic, like the insane people that I am, and no, rather than hospital scary, but boy, you just learned so quickly. I mean, an audience is a jury. If one person laughs, they all it's gotta be a group that we have to agree on it and we have a sense of justice. This isn't fair. We're laughing at someone who can't help themselves. I'm sure you know this. Yeah,

Jeff Dwoskin 9:23

it's interesting, though, to always hear a different kind of art and how like it applies. Yeah, with comedy, stand up, comedy, The a miss, pause, the wrong word, you just stumble a word, you know, anything like that. So, like I always would, audio in a minimum audio record, anything I did, so you could play it back and it sounds like it's the same thing, like what you were just describing, the nuance of just the clothes that mentally would have put them in a different kind of mindset, of who these people were, or what they were going through, could change the whole reaction. To, yeah, to what it is. It's amazing.

Billy Aronson 10:02

And I've also noticed in my writing, you can't feel like people can't feel like you're trying to make them laugh. Can't try to be funny. It just is, let the thing be cut. A lot of the words, perhaps take it in the minute. That's why I couldn't act. But if I would get something right one next night, the next night, I couldn't, because I'd be aware of it. Oh, this is going to be funny. You can't Telegraph that in any way. Very hard. What you do is really hard. I admire performers like, you're you're stars, you're heroes, really. I sit by myself and do it.

Jeff Dwoskin 10:29

It's funny. You say that because, like, the first couple, I guess it's like, nobody tells you this till it happens when you're doing comedy. But, like, I mean, I crushed the first few times I was on and then I did it so hard. It was, it was horrible. Like, horrible, like, my wife even came out to me after and goes, Wow, if that was me, I'd be crying right now. I mean, like, even right? And then somebody, same words, right, same words. And it was exactly the difference in nuance that you were just saying. I wasn't asking for the laughs, and once I knew the laughs were supposed to be there because of executing it, my brain shifted and how I'm trying to get the laugh, because I know that's, you know, put a quarter and get it out, and then you had to train yourself to go back to the other way, to so that it's not that way at all. Yeah, it's a fascinating there's like a studio, the Matthew Perry show. It was Aaron Sorkin, you know, it was like, the behind the scenes of the fictional Saturday live. They had a similar scene. There's a great scene where they're like, I don't understand. It killed in dress, and then it didn't work. And he's like, because in dress, you asked for the pepper, and in and live, you asked for the laugh, like a real subtle thing, and it's like, it's hard, like when, when the nuance works, it's great, but it is. It's to get to it. It's difficult.

Billy Aronson 11:46

Comedy is nearly impossible, and yet you do it, we I actually find there's a similar corresponding thing for heavier stuff. Again, I have to, I don't listen for laughs, for that, but the breathing and the shifting the seat, you can tell this just isn't working, or it is, and it's subtle. That's why the language, the words, have to be just right, not too many words. Don't try too hard. Don't push so hard. Don't think, Oh, this is going to be powerful and make them pride, let it keep it simple and let the thing just happen.

Jeff Dwoskin 12:12

So what's the process when you're doing a play or musical, anything like where the only way to find out is to actually do it like you go through all the process, are you like, All right, well, we're just gonna have to burn through this audience to learn. Like, like, when you're in the back, like, what are you doing? What do you I like? Just taking notes. Are other people doing this too that are, like, five of you in the back just go and then comparing after, hey, remember when he touched his head? Maybe he should be wearing a hat or whatever.

Billy Aronson 12:41

I will say it's gotten easier. I mean, that's good news after the first, I imagine for you too, after the first, I missed the thing about mental illness, or maybe how, how it should be handled. I had a number of of opportunities to learn from failing, and then I sort of, I sort of haven't failed in the same way. At least, I will say since then, I sort of get what I need to do, how to do my thing. Very rarely. Now do I end up changing a script very much from when I let it out of the house to production. There are changes, but it's not as huge as it used to be. So it's it's not as much like you just throw it up. You know, who knows what's going to happen? At least it's been so far. I hope it continues to be that way. But I'm working on a musical now, and let's hope we get

Jeff Dwoskin 13:21

it right. I'm sure it'll be amazing. So what's the process of putting together a musical? You come up with the idea take take it from there, or is it even

Billy Aronson 13:31

Well, yeah, the hardest thing for me is collaboration is far in every form. I mean, as I gave you an example from a playwriting with a director, with a set designer, that collaboration is tricky, but with a composer, it's so intimate. I just don't write music, you know? I wish I did. So you get to work with someone who has these skills that you admire and love, which is thrilling. So they're not you, and that's great, but then when they start working, you realize you're not me I wouldn't have done, you know, it doesn't feel exactly like what I would have done. So you have to talk, and you have to work with each other and find a language for fucking without hurting each other's feelings. But saying this isn't working is why? How can we change one of us? Can we change together? Make it fantastic? Because you can't, like, compromise, like, like a marriage. Sometimes we say, Okay, I won't do all of this. You don't do all of that. Or you do. You care about vacuuming so you can do that. You can. I'll care about the speakers. I'll get the speakers. It's, everybody cares about every word. It's all going to have music. But it's such a thrilling you know, when it works, we love musicals or music theater when it works. So cool. So it's worth that, but it is. But, yeah, it starts with, in my case, until we started with an concept that I have for what it should be about, and this the one I'm working on now, I actually, because I've learned from the past, from like, working on rent and just with rent, I just went to Jonathan and said, here's my idea. And I had a one page outline, but we went in different directions that, you know, if you like something different about it than I like with this one I'm working on now, I wrote a whole script so at least, you know, people can hate it. They can say, Oh, this isn't for me, but at least they can see what it is. And I found a Korean jazz composer who. I love who lives in Brooklyn, Ji Haley, and her music is so cool. It's just like a scream. It's gorgeous scream. And that's what I needed for this story that I'm telling about love and war. So we've been working together and, you know, talk a lot, and we pass things to each other that actually, I mean, there's a

Jeff Dwoskin 15:15

lot to the music, there's the book, right? And we're like, is the book the music, or is the book the words

Billy Aronson 15:20

the book is. Book is a very tricky concept in musicals. Okay, the book is, is the drama, the script play of it. But if some, sometimes they write the book, then the songwriters come in and say, Okay, we want a song here instead of that speech. So they or they take out a scene, or they take out a speech and replace it with a song that might use words from the what the book writer wrote, make it rhyme, or give it a rhythm, etcetera. They write songs. In this case, I'm also, I have the script with the lyrics I get. You could call it a libretto, because it's the whole all the words, and then the muse, then we then the but the words change. When she starts composing, we might find a cool line and say, Whoa, that's that's really hot. That should be the chorus. Change everything to fit that. You gotta change a lot of musicals. It's two different people, you know, that makes it much harder for me than a play to roll, but much more joyful in a way

Jeff Dwoskin 16:05

cool. Yeah, I love theater. My parents were kind enough to bring me to shows. So I kind of grew up seeing many, many plays. And you grew up near New York, Michigan, Detroit, so we had, like, the Fisher theater and like, plays are everywhere. Yeah, plays are everywhere. And, you know, I got it. I mean, not to sound blasphemous or anything, but the only one I can't sit through and do not understand is cats. I just, I

Billy Aronson 16:34

that is blasphemous. I know I haven't seen cats, but I know when I got to New York in the mid 80s, that was the thing that was the pinnacle of musical theater. I don't

Jeff Dwoskin 16:42

I never understood, like, I would say I had the, I had the ability to see it for free, a huge production on a cruise ship, and I still left cats is like, starts off real, great. Yeah, it was like, and then like, and then it has, like, 45 minutes of nothing, and then Rum Tum Tugger. And then eventually they get the memories.

Billy Aronson 17:03

It's about cats, that's all. I know it's

Jeff Dwoskin 17:05

about cats, but I will say rent is one of my favorites. So thanks for bringing out, bringing that into the world. That's amazing. So I did. My question is, in terms of rent, is what is Adam gut up to these days?

Billy Aronson 17:21

Well, I It's pronounced Adam Gittle. Adam Gittle, he's had a great career, actually, perhaps not, as you know, he has not a blockbuster Broadway hit, but he's represented on Broadway right now in the beautiful Floyd Collins. And he is a really talented composer and smart, a different kind of thing. I guess his work emphasizes art, I would say more than pop. He's doing fine without me. Well,

Jeff Dwoskin 17:46

just just to back up with the story for a second, because I jumped ahead. So for those listening, so when Billy came up with the idea for rent, he was introduced to two people, Adam and Jonathan Larson, that's right, and he met with Adam first, but Adam passed on it. I know you kind of, you gave, uh, kind of the elevator pitch of the rent. So when you what was it, when you saw La Boheme, it just inspired you. And

Billy Aronson 18:11

you're, oh, yeah. When I was new in town, I lived in a tiny, drug infested building in Hell's Kitchen, which then was closer to earning the name Hell's Kitchen. And my apartment was so small, I shared it with a roommate. I didn't even have my own room, so I kind of had to get out a lot to daydream and stuff. And at night, I would wander up nine blocks to the Metropolitan Opera because my dad used to love the opera, and I would get standing room for really cheap because I was really poor, and I watched a bunch of operas. And even though I didn't understand the language and they didn't have subtitles at the time, the drama, you could feel the drama through the music. So I kind of fell in love with it. And I know people are turned off by the vibrato, but that sort of got to me, too, the way it was, like, you know, the the notes ram into you, like swords. Anyway, for some reason, bohem really spoke to me, I think because it's, it's the production is by Zephyr Franco zeffirel, who designs luscious, glorious sets, and the music is by Bucha. Is so glorious. Greg melodies about artists who are very poor and starving and dying, and so I love I did. I was very moved by the love story. But when I would walk out back to Hell's Kitchen, it just the contrast between that and my world was so shocking. In the 80s, people were dying of AIDS, and you could see that homelessness was on the rise, and everybody was valuing money and was cool to make money. All of a sudden, in the 70s, I don't remember, no one told me that, so I was expecting that people would be impressed when I said I was a playwright. They weren't. So I wanted to write something that used that story and those characters in that world, but the music that was bracing, sort of about now. So I had this idea. I played with it for a while, and then at one point, when I was between readings of plays, because I was then first, I just wrote plays and got readings. People would get together and do readings of and even if one was highly praised, you know, wouldn't get produced right away. So I had some time, and I said, I want to write something besides this play this time. Time. So why not try musical? I went to Playwrights Horizons. There were there was some interest in my work there, and they did musicals. Ira Weitzman, who was in charge of those musicals, recommended me to two composers, Adam Git, as you mentioned, and Jonathan Morrison. So I got in touch with Jonathan, as you say, and he was excited about it.

Jeff Dwoskin 20:18

Yeah, I'd say, to say the least, he was excited. So talk about the early collaborations with Jonathan Larson. Like, tell me about that, because you worked together for a period of time, and then then didn't, then didn't,

Billy Aronson 20:32

yeah, so that was like 1988 we both wanted to do this very badly. I met with him on his rooftop. He lived in a tiny apartment to where there was no room to meet. So we went up to the roof and we sat in a couple beach chairs and talked about it. Right away. He had very specific feelings about it. He felt it should be our generation's hair. I loved hair still might be my favorite musical, but I never thought of it as like speaking for a generator or ant, an anthem, anthemic. He thought it would bring our generation back to the theater. I mean, I just was, I thought if playwrights horizon this off Broadway theater did it and it was a success. I mean, to me, that would be such a dream, an Off Broadway production of a musical I never thought of changing the world. I mean, I thought it was kind of nuts to tell you the truth. It was just like, it's good to believe in yourself. You know, I encourage that, and I like him believing in the project. But right away, there was a sort of, I didn't see it. I mean, Broadway then didn't seem like anything that would be on Broadway. As you mentioned, cats was on Broadway. Musicals about what we called yuppies were on Broadway. Just was the opposite of people in black who were dying and starving loud music, you know, for young people, I mean, who could afford to go to theater, who would relate to that story we were talking about to go to the Broadway theater, but we worked on it. I did a draft. First I did a draft that was terrible, and then I did a draft that he really liked, and he got very excited about it. It had rent the title, tune in it, and Santa Fe. And I should tell you, he was so excited. He just started writing music. We never met, I never met with him to read the songs or anything. He just reading them on the script. He started writing, spent a long time on it. Then he had me over and played me the songs on a little cheap piano that he had. It was like a wasn't an M and E organ, but it was a Casio. I think it was little, almost like a toy, one step above a toy. And he played, we gone up. So at first it sounded a little silly. I think, okay, what is this? Then I sort of gave into it. And then the next song, Santa Fe sounded really cool, even on the clinky, I don't know. I just thought that was a great and by I should tell you, I thought it was gorgeous. It was he played me. So he'd sent me songs to we shared work with each other before we decided to work together. Of course, the songs he shared with me were good. They made me think of Rocky Horror Picture Show actually, which I love, just pop rock, fun and funny. I mean, I suggested we do a comedy maybe, but no he wanted to do thought it could be used for the purposes of good anyway. But I should tell you, I thought was better than everything he showed me. It was just complex and beautiful and strange and romantic in a fresh way. So I was really excited. And then the next step was he wanted to report a demo tape, which costs what seemed to me to be a lot of money. Cost, like $300 600 whatever it was, 300 a piece or 300 I just thought, I don't want to spend money on this. I mean, we're not going to make money, fine, but I can't. I don't make $600 a month. What am I getting? It was a lot of money, but I trusted him. Got a really nice tape, and we passed it around to lots of theaters. And people like the songs generally, but they didn't know how it would go together to make a musical. And we couldn't convince anybody to make to give us money at that point. And we both really at about 30, we both felt old. He had lots of readings of musicals. I'd had lots of readings of plays. We did not want to spend time on something that was not going to get made, and if people the doors weren't flying open. And we also didn't really get each other. It wasn't comfortable. Sanders, it wasn't as comfortable as you and I speaking right now. It was Jonathan. Was always he knew what he wanted. He's used to work doing his own thing. In fact, he did after so we put rent aside. He did a show. His version of bohem was sort of one character, you know, which he acted in by himself. He wrote the words the story of music, everything, and he acted in it. He liked doing things his way, about him. And I like doing things my way. I have my own delicate sense of humor, weirdness thing. So we were very quick to let it go. I certainly was. And then after a while, we went and worked on other things. And after a while, he got back in touch and said, I'd like to work on it some more. Would you mind if I took it? Went ahead on my own, and I said, please go ahead on your own. Let's not waste those three songs. But if we ever make any money, I want my $300 back. Okay, so we've got something in writing, because, God forbid, I didn't want to lose those $300 or whatever it was that said, if it ever makes money, I'll get credit for original concept and additional lyrics, because he was one of us those three songs, and did, in fact. And then I get credit in compensation. Yay. Writing things down. Always got things in writing people, if it involves money, I brought my eventually, I brought a lawyer in to make sure that all works. Down anyway.

Jeff Dwoskin 25:01

Had he not suggested making the tape for $600 300 each. Would you do you think you would have just gone? All right, go ahead.

Billy Aronson 25:12

We'll never know. Jeff will never know.

Jeff Dwoskin 25:16

I think there's a 60% chance.

Billy Aronson 25:19

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I'm just glad it's a quirky story. But it worked out fine. And then, of course, rank became absolutely huge.

Jeff Dwoskin 25:25

That spoiler, right? You talk about the songs that you contributed, and obviously the idea, right? So you got there. But were there any of the characters in the that you created, like Mark or Roger or Mimi, like, were any of those in some of the early versions that of the things you created, or was it still just kind of a rougher idea with a few songs closer

Billy Aronson 25:46

to be it was rough with a few songs. I mean, he built on built on it, but he made it his own. He made it about his life and his friends, his own vision, and he had a lot of help from other people. On the other end, the director of new musical always has huge input and makes a difference. And that's why they get percentage of the royalties forever. He had a dramatur. He was working with the actors probably helped him, you know. So as I say, it's not a lot of me admit, but the lyrics of some songs and the basic idea, well,

Jeff Dwoskin 26:14

you get the full assist, if nothing else, even without, I'd say the the introduction of the idea, right? Is, is amazing.

Billy Aronson 26:23

It's a funny thing. I mean, you can do less. I think West Side Story, Jerome Robbins, it says original concept by Jerome Robbins, the choreographer. His idea was to do a musical based on Romeo and Juliet involving Jews and Catholics. I think, yeah, but his credit is on the cover of every script. And then again, he's Jerome Robbins, so he gets what he wants.

Jeff Dwoskin 26:43

Well, right? It was funny because I George Caris, the guy who was in West Side Story, the guy who won the Oscar anyway, when I was doing the research, you know, why? Why did a bunch of Jews write a story about Puerto Rican? Was like, because it's not how it started. Actually is a Jewish story. They adapted it when the city was changing and all that kind of stuff. So you're right. You really know your musical theater history there. I know now, right? I didn't know that. I didn't know this about rents until I started talking to you. So all these started out with Jewish people. We bring so much to the world. Thank you.

Billy Aronson 27:17

How can you tell I'm Jewish? Oh, it's in the book. That's right. You do, yeah, people know on the subway. Everyone knows I don't even I'm not religious, I wasn't bar mitzvahed. But yeah, there you go. There are a lot of our people in the in the Broadway industry.

Jeff Dwoskin 27:28

We're a creative type. So when Jonathan Larson was creating rent and he decided to go on his own with your blessing, before the Off Broadway production or the first time was going to be done, besides getting the tickets for it, was there other times along the way that you were did you kind of collaborate? Were you like, Did he share anything with you along the way? Or was it kind of like bit of silence, still, just was mostly done?

Billy Aronson 27:56

No, well, he was very good. He asked people for what they thought. He would go around asking everybody what they thought. And so he would send me strips and tapes. And I was very impressed for said he sent me one of the strips. Fact, he made me sign another document that said, Okay, this is a Jonathan Larson musical, but you'll get this credit, and I can see why, because it was really clear that he was onto something big. It was better than the other things he'd done bigger, I thought. And within the new the framework of the story, his songs were getting much better. They were sharp, they were they had purpose. They had a sense of depth and purpose. Along with being catchy and fun, he was always a good rock and roll songwriter. So yeah, I enjoyed listening and looking. I didn't have major comments. I didn't get my my hands into it a lot, nor did he need me to. But I sure enjoyed watching it blossom. So

Jeff Dwoskin 28:41

you have tickets to the production that takes place on January 25 1996 and tragically, unfortunately, one of the beats of this story is Jonathan Larson dies the day before, yeah, from aortic aneurysm. I don't think anyone who does it doesn't know about rent, doesn't know that piece, having known him and then actually been there on January 25 What was it like? Just, I mean, was it must have been like everyone was just, I imagine everyone was just sobbing the whole time. But like, yeah,

Billy Aronson 29:14

when I went to see the preview, everyone was in shock. It was really quiet. And of course, everyone had to see the show had gotten very popular all of a sudden, and it was weird for me, for a lot of reasons. Okay, so I'm sitting there. I had spoken to him couple nights ago, maybe night before that, well, the night before he died, about the program, what my bio was going to be. And so when I went to the theater with my wife, we both felt very sad for Jonathan that he wasn't there to see this, that it was going to open. And I also being a human with an ego, I looked in the program, my bio wasn't there, so I felt so sorry for him, and I felt angry at him, you know, and I felt guilty for feeling angry, and I felt embarrassed for having dropped out of this fantastic show, and I felt scared that my lyrics that remained were going to ruin the show. I mean, I had so. Me, it was all there. It was a very emotional thing for me, but, of course, worse for many other people. And then the show that we saw was fantastic. I thought I was, you know, it was one of those experiences you don't even want to have again. It was so powerful. He just died, and the whole cast knew he just died, and the whole cast was fighting, you know, to make something beautiful in His Name that he'd left them. It's a play about fighting. You know, after if you're young and all the odds are against you, and people are dying and the government doesn't get you, and there's disease, and yet you're fighting, you're fighting to make something beautiful. And they would sing those songs I should tell you about seasons of love, my gosh. And there's only this, you know, all of it, it was so powerful. And they were great. Was a great cast, and the songs were fantastic. I mean, there were songs I hadn't heard before that were better than anything. So it was a pretty powerful time. And you sort of knew something's going to happen with this. I still didn't think it would be Broadway, because I didn't see anything on Broadway that was like it. But Jonathan was right. I mean, Broadway changed so it could fit on there. I just, I thought it was going to be extended maybe in the, you know, run. But the reviews were so astounded, were so positive. I'd never seen anything like that in the press, in the papers. I mean, there was a picture, big picture, of every actor in the cast, and there were multiple articles about Jonathan and Frank Rich came back to write a review of it after he'd been out of away from the times the reviews were just hands down. You're never going to get a review like this. You're never going to read a review like this. Hats off to Mr. Larson that kind of thing. So, yeah, that had a lot of power too. Press was all in it, and it moved to Broadway, and it was so popular at the time that I would walk down the street and hear people talking about it. Somebody on the cell phone saying, Yeah, mom, and it's based on La Boheme. My dentist asked me about he said, Have you heard about this musical? It's sort of a, you're in the theater. It's sort of a, an adaptation of La Boheme, or take off on, yeah, I've heard of it, yeah. Friends called me. Everybody knew about it. I'd never seen a play. Have that effect on people. They were talking about it everywhere. It was just such an event. And then when it opened on Broadway, thank God I got a ticket to that. I was in the second to last row again with my wife. But it was just weird. So many celebrities there and there. It wasn't this huge stage, just what he'd imagine would be, imagine would be on Broadway, that people would say it's our generation's hair. They said that in the reviews, they were just what he'd imagined it would be. They said it's going to bring a generation to the theater, like you said it would. And of course, people really stopped and mostly loved it a lot. It was a cool experience. I would say, overall, very emotional.

Jeff Dwoskin 32:34

It's got to feel great, though, to have a part in something that was so monumental culturally. I mean, it was, yeah,

Billy Aronson 32:41

now it does. I get it. It took a while for me to let that sink in. At first I felt, well, it's Jonathan's thing. I shouldn't feel anything about this, but I began to realize it's how important it was to a lot of people's lives. Gives people hope and excitement about when people sing the songs everywhere, and people become actors, so they can do those roles, and they do them in camp. So it's a cool thing overall, and I'm glad to have had anything to do with it.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:03

Yeah, I think I saw it at least three times. You did, yeah, I remember seeing it the first time. And this isn't anything about rent. It's just for me with Broadway, like it's hard to understand lyrics and words if you just go in cold, like when my wife and daughter went and saw Hamilton. I mean, they could have recited the whole thing before even seeing the play. Wow. And I think so we went. So we, after the first time we saw rent, we're like, this is great, but I don't even, I don't know the words were. So we got the soundtrack, learned the soundtrack, and then went back couple, at least a couple times. My wife and daughters might have seen it even more than that, but that's funny. I've not seen many, more than one time tried two cats. That was, yeah, I did. I did try real hard. Oh, that's good. And I think maybe Les Mis and Miss Saigon. Okay, well, you don't see much Miss Saigon anymore, but that's a great play. That is a great play. I

Billy Aronson 33:58

enjoyed it. I saw that a couple times, yeah, also based on an opera by Puccini. It's funny. What you describe is my experience with a lot of things that I really end up liking a lot the first time. It's like, seems weird to me, like, when I first saw Rocky Horror Picture, thought, what Rocky Horror Picture Show? I thought, why are they screaming so much? Shut up. I'm trying to understand this. Something about it stayed with me, and I came back the next week and the next week and the next week, and then I was the one. So anyway, I'm glad you gave Brent the chance.

Jeff Dwoskin 34:24

I feel like, Grant. I mean, I'm not, I don't know about this, but, like, rent, if I recall, was one of those where people would go and get the lottery, like, to get seats. I don't remember that happening. I mean, that could happen every show. I have no idea. I'm not talking about the TKS booth. I'm talking about like, like Hamilton. I feel like that was, that was the only other show I can think of like that had that obsession where people would do that, but

Billy Aronson 34:45

pretty exciting when it happens, like, God knows, you can't control it. It just happens, or it doesn't

Jeff Dwoskin 34:50

happen. So we got four Tony Awards, Pulitzer Prize for Drama, 12 year run on Broadway,

Billy Aronson 34:55

yeah, which, at the time, was one of the longest in history. Yeah, almost. As long as cats, and then almost cats keeps coming back with you. I know I just maybe someday I'll see it and really appreciate it. Let me know, I know it's about cats.

Jeff Dwoskin 35:11

Did you see the film? Did you get because they brought a lot of the original cats back

Billy Aronson 35:14

for the film? Didn't? Did you recommend it? Should I see it? Oh, the film of rent. The film of rent. Oh, okay, I did see the film of ring. Yeah, they brought a lot of the cast back. I actually got to see them film a little bit of it when I was in San Francisco. That was fun. Oh, that's cool, although movies are so slow. There was they were doing a scene from Santa Fe but they were just sitting in the kitchen all day shooting this one position over and over again anyway. But yes, I did see the film. Did you enjoy it?

Jeff Dwoskin 35:39

I don't. I remember not thinking it was as good as maybe the play. You know, sometimes I think movie adaptions are, you know, they can go either way. They can go either way. Yeah, that doesn't take away. People

Billy Aronson 35:49

say that a lot, but I will tell you that people that a lot of the young people I talk to, and by young, I mean younger than me. So there could be any age that's their only experience with this through the movie. So I guess I'm glad it's out there, because they they seem to enjoy it. That

Jeff Dwoskin 36:02

makes sense. Having seen the play, you have a different emotional attachment to something.

Billy Aronson 36:06

Yeah, you can't beat live, I think when something works live, but that's very powerful.

Jeff Dwoskin 36:10

And then they also did, and that was rent. Was one of the live productions. They haven't done a live show on TV in a while. It was such a thing for a while,

Billy Aronson 36:17

I think because of rent, I think the ratings weren't what they'd hoped. So they haven't done it a lot. Yeah, it was. It was an exciting, risky idea producers to try that.

Jeff Dwoskin 36:25

It's too bad, because the grease and rent and what The Wiz, what they did. Oh, The Sound of Music might have been the first one. Oh, really, wow, I think the Carrie Underwood. There's all the Oh, that's right, good show. All right, so rent, that's awesome. All right, so you've written a bunch of kid programs too. I mean, yes, I have, well before we get to that, let's talk about the non kid ones. This shows my age, but a short attention span theater. You remember that show? Oh god, yeah, yes. I was early Comedy Central. I was, I was Comedy Central when they were still showing the original. Whose Line Is It Anyway? Every

Billy Aronson 37:00

day? Do you mean you were on Comedy Central? You watched watching it like, yeah, yeah,

Jeff Dwoskin 37:04

okay, watching it and enjoying it when, maybe before it was even Comedy Central, you know, it's just whatever, yeah, the comedy channel, yeah, cable was more adventurous then it was very Anything could happen on cable. Mark Maron, I think, was the host, yes, short attention span

Billy Aronson 37:17

theater was one of the shows that they'd had. It sort of from the beginning of Comedy Central, where you could just turn it on and watch just turn it on and watch comedy clips, funny clips for movies all the time, movies or TV shows. This was the last incarnation of that show. Was down to half an hour. I think it was funny clips from the kids in the hall or Monty Python or whatever they were trying to promote one week. And Mark Maron was the host who, at the time, was not known. That was, I think, his beginning in TV, and I always admired him a lot. He looked like Jim Morrison. He was just really cool and dark. And I was supposed to write stuff that was set up so he could say, and now we're going to watch a clip of the kids in the hall, and then there'll be Monty Python, if so there wasn't juicy stuff. So I would try being a a goofy comedian, comic type. I would try to write witty or punny or stuff, you know, clever stuff for those wraparounds, Mark is Mark, the way I put it, mark is bitter. Is is dark humor. I'm bittersweet. I'm like, a different kind of chocolate. So it really didn't work very well. This is when I realized they're all different kinds of funny. I mean, I always wanted to write for Comedy Central, because it had comedy in the title. I thought, Man, if I could just get into Comedy Central, I'd stay there for the rest of my life. But I realized writing jokes is very hard again. It's the trick is not You're not trying to make someone laugh. You're just can't feel like you're trying to make someone laugh, although I guess you are ultimately. So I wasn't very good at that, but I enjoyed working. We did do one episode with Leslie Nielsen of the Naked Gun. And although I just love Leslie Nielsen, for those who remember him, very funny man. He hosted one show. He brought on a whoopee cushion, and he made it work. Mark and I both loved that episode.

Jeff Dwoskin 38:46

Leslie Nelson was kind of known for that whoopee cushion.

Billy Aronson 38:50

Genius, the guy. He's so serious and handsome and dry that he could just goofy things, and it's insane. That's how I would

Jeff Dwoskin 38:57

I got to interview David Zucker, and we talked about airplane and their whole philosophy, which is what led to Leslie Nielsen becoming, like this, reinvented, huge comedic star, which was, you know, you talk about not trying to make them laugh like be as serious as you can. You're not in a comedy, and they'll laugh and like works, it's deadpan. You will watch those things, they are deadpan, serious lines every one of his and it's the funniest thing you've ever heard in your life. Speaking of funny Beavis and Butthead was

Billy Aronson 39:28

that was the first example of a show that I watched before I got the call to write for it. So it was so exciting when it came when it first came out. I don't know if your listeners would remember it, but it was shocking people were talking about that show because it was so on the surface it seemed like icky these poor loser kids who were saying talking about boobs all the time. My wife and I both laughed our heads off at it. I wasn't even sure why the kids just sit there watching TV and eating Doritos and laughing at stuff. It was so weird. And I think there was something true about it. I guess I related to the fact that when you're an adolescent, unless you're an athlete. And I was not or built like an athlete. You feel as a boy, you feel like a loser, like the girls are much taller than than you, and you can have a chance. I mean, there's so much more mature. They're grown ups already emotionally. And you're 12, you know, or 13 and and you're all broken out so, but all you can think about is girls. So you, you it's a pathetic situation to be in. But these two hang with their their best friends, and they hang out and they just laugh, and they don't feel like losers. It's almost, it's beautiful, I think, almost and moving, that they find beauty in their pathetic adolescent situation. So anyway, it worked great for me, and I loved I was honored to write for it. I think Mike Judge is just brilliant. I pitched a bunch of ideas, and they, they accepted a few of them, and I was proud and honored to write a few. Didn't pay much, but so I would have paid them to write reviews. And by the time

Jeff Dwoskin 40:44

that's a great one, that is a really great Mike Judge is brilliant. I I'd say office space is probably one of my favorite movies and one of the most brilliant comedies. Yeah, like, ever cool. And Idiocracy, I think, is,

Billy Aronson 40:58

yeah, he's original. He's a true original on television and movie. In

Jeff Dwoskin 41:03

your world of PBS, you develop peg and cat. Is it peg and cat or peg plus? Actually, Peg plus Pat. Yeah, you get the math in there. I didn't know if that, Oh, that's right, because that, Oh, that's very clever math. Check it is a match. There you go. So much sense when you say it out loud. Why I didn't say it that way?

Billy Aronson 41:19

No one does.

Jeff Dwoskin 41:22

Don't worry about obvious ones. You pointed out, though that was an interesting story, you talk about a lot in the book, just developing that, and this is where you became an Emmy machine.

Billy Aronson 41:32

Emmy machine, baby. Yeah. Well, that television always started out for me as a way to make money. If I could do it, great, you know, I'd support my playwriting. It didn't have to be something that I loved. I didn't expect it to be my art. I'm serving this other person. But in peg plus cat, Jennifer Oxley, who's an artist who had done lots of animation for PBS for kids for young people, was invited to pitch a show to PBS about math for the very young. And she invited me to team up with her. We worked on a show called The Wonder Pets in one Nickelodeon a while ago. So we pitched. We came up with an idea for a math show about a little girl whose life is math word problems. She wakes up and everything is 100 chickens that she has to get back into a coop, or something like that. And Jennifer drew beautiful designs for it, and I wrote up some funny stories. Ideas for funny stories. What we didn't realize is that when PBS invited us to pitch. There were also two dozen other people they'd invited us to pitch. So we put a lot of time working on it, realizing we had a 5% chance of getting a show. And then we got to the next level. They they liked our pitch, so they said, Okay, now we'd like you to draw it out. Do it to make a big Bible, which means, you know, basically tell everything you can possibly tell about the show, and show every characters from every angle. That was about 80 pages, and we spent months on that. I don't think we were still getting we were getting any money at that point. It's PBS. You do it for the owner. I guess we really wanted this show. Then the next stage, it was like American Idol. So then you're down to three who get to make a pilot that we could did get lots of money for. And luckily, our pilot was chosen to go on the air. And it was just a dream. It was an it's, again, it's one of those things. The lesson we can take from this is, I think it's, it's worth the risk. When someone asks you to pitch an idea, pitch, have ideas. Pitch it. Love one of them, you know, make sure you love the stuff that you pitch. If they actually develop it. If they're for real, develop it. Take the risk. So what? It's a risk, but if once in a while, it pays off, that's your career. We had this fantastic dream opportunity. We got to make it for two seasons, which lasted eight years. I think, we formed a company. They gave us money to form our own company to make the show. We were dealing with millions of dollars, which was not ours to keep, but, you know, to pay people. So Jennifer got to hire her favorite animators and designers, and we hired some of our favorite composers, and I got to work with my favorite writers and animators in Canada and funders at the Fred Rogers company in Pittsburgh. And it was a blast. I guess the coolest thing about it was we were making our arts. We got to love what we were doing. We got to write stories that we love. PBS really respected us, and they didn't give us much. I don't think they. They might have rejected one story because it was about the Bible and said, You can't do that out of the 130 that we wrote. They, you know, they had notes about too many toilet jokes here and there. That's just problem I'm going to have wherever I go. But, um, mostly they, they let us make something that we loved, and it was a

Jeff Dwoskin 44:17

blast. That is awesome. I was also very impressed with backyard against because I remember watching that with my

Billy Aronson 44:23

kids. Oh, good, yeah, yeah. Writing for kids is exciting. Personally, I guess my case is I want to write something that grown ups, like you can stay in the room try to make something like a fairy tale is great on many levels, so that there's something even as a kid. So you like it now, but you might like it in four years, rather than big brother doesn't have to run screaming from the room. You know. Just try to write stuff that's cool, that you love, that you truly would love to watch, but doesn't have a lot of sex in it. You know, I

Jeff Dwoskin 44:49

think PBS, Sesame Street, like a lot of those shows, were good on multiple levels. You know, Batman 66 was that way too, you know, like, I just, I randomly some of those lines. Stick in your head. I just randomly said one, like, literally, two days ago to my wife that I probably heard Elmo say 10 years ago.

Billy Aronson 45:09

Yeah, right, yeah. Thank you, Elmo. I hope PBS does Okay. As we speak, they're being assaulted. Fingers crossed. They've done a lot of great work, and they've done work that no one else would do. We did a show, a Muslim holiday we done, we we did a Christmas special, of course, which, you know, for our big audience. And then we did a Hanukkah special, which a lot of people do. And then we decided to do an A Holiday Special, honoring the Muslim holiday of Edo Adha, because no one was doing that. And I live in Brooklyn, you know, there are people of all different faiths here. The response was great from the Muslim community and from the rest of the world, from others who thought, thank God, my kid can see something that helps them understand their neighbors. We can acknowledge people of different faiths and they live in our neighborhood, and that's okay. No one but PBS would have done that, because 1% of America is Muslim, probably less. So it's not it's not to make a profit that you do that episode. You do it because it's important. And PBS would do that kind of thing while being hip. I thought most of their shows were pretty hip. I hope they they continue to thrive. I think

Jeff Dwoskin 46:08

it's great that you did that. I think it's important for us to like, I used to always love it when somebody would know something about Judaism, you know, that wasn't Jewish or, you know, something like that. It was always cool. You know, you like, if someone gets married, you know, you most of the mayor, we have wedding scenes on TV and stuff are Catholic weddings. Occasionally, you see, like, a Jewish wedding, you know the thing, and the Fantastic Four is Jewish, you know that? Yeah, yeah. I have the cover of a Fantastic Four where he's wearing Yamaka and, you know, just, it's nice when you can see your own thing and share it with other people, because I think that's what kind of brings the walls down, is, yes, the things that people have issue with or things that they don't understand, and so they just make up a version of it, or whatever they were told that becomes,

Billy Aronson 46:50

yeah, you're right. When talk to people, they like. You could talk to people, it works out. So the important thing, I agree with what you're

Jeff Dwoskin 46:56

saying, All right, so what's the one thing we did not talk about that you'd like to mention that you just love and you just need the world to know,

Billy Aronson 47:03

wow, I'm left handed. That's not important.

Jeff Dwoskin 47:06

I'm left handed too. Really, get out geniuses.

Billy Aronson 47:10

Some are, there are others. Who are we respect right handed people too. Right

Jeff Dwoskin 47:13

handed people have every right to exist. They sure do.

Billy Aronson 47:17

But a lot of presidents, Obama, Clinton, I think GW Bush, I think was so a Republican can be left handed. Anybody can be left handed. Anyone can be anyone. I'm proud to be left handed. I we haven't talked a bunch about depression, which, because it's not a really funny subject, usually, but that's something I struggled with all my life, and I write about it a lot in the book, that anxiety was big all my life, and I guess depression was low grade for a long time, but it it made it hard for me to be comfortable with other people, and that's something I realized as playwriting begins as the most introverted career in the world. You're all by yourself in your head, but then when you start to get a little success, you're out there with lots of people having to talk about your most personal brain, most humiliating stuff inside you and your love level, you know, your romances and your family and your anger and your bitterness and your so it gets something I had to deal with, and it hit me really hard at one point when I was about 60. It was crippling, my depression. It just came on and for No, I don't you know life was good, but it was something I just had to deal with. So I talk about that in a lot in the book, and I only mention it because that's one thing people often say thank they thank me for being honest about that, because I'm noticing even young people now deal with anxiety a lot in their 20s, whether it's harder to be young than it used to be, or harder to be alive, or something with cellphones has to do with it, or whether we just talk about it differently, whether we just had had a different words for it in the old days, I don't know, but we people maybe drank more at work. But anyway, that's something I talk about too. But for me, it has a happy ending, because you can get through it if you talk about it and you do what you gotta do. I do yoga now a lot. I feel great. I'm a very happy person after all those struggles, and I continue to write. I was worried at first, and if I'm happy, what am I going to write about? But guess what? It's even better when you're happy.

Jeff Dwoskin 48:56

Well, do appreciate you sharing all of the things that you shared in your book. It is. It's a very raw, open and honest book. I have no thank you. You'll inspire and give hope to to many people.

Billy Aronson 49:11

I hope so. That would be great. That would be great. Thanks, Jeff, thanks for hanging out with me. You're awesome. Oh, I loved it. You're so much fun to be with. I know right now I wouldn't want to tell everyone,

Jeff Dwoskin 49:23

yeah, no, I appreciate it. This is great. Your stories are great. You're awesome. You too. Let's stay in touch. And for sure, what I look forward to, I'll look for your new your new musical.

Billy Aronson 49:34

Right now, it looks like it's going to be a CO production between the Prague Shakespeare Company and the Cincinnati Shakespeare players. Neither one is very close to where you are, but we'll try to you know now that I've seen that Jonathan Larson can dream of Broadway. Why not? Why not? Right,

Jeff Dwoskin 49:48

there's still plenty of room to continue to change the world. So yeah, might as well go for it. Why

Billy Aronson 49:53

not? Thank you.

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