Spring Departing
By Jane Holahan
After two years, Jonathan Groff will leave the cast of Broadway’s highly successful “Spring Awakening” to star in a summer production of “Hair.”
It got him a Tony nomination, turned him into a heart throb for teenage girls and caused his image to be plastered throughout the Great White Way.
But after playing the role of Melchior Gabor for two years, on and off Broadway, Jonathan Groff, 22, is leaving “Spring Awakening.” His last show is May 18.
“I could do this show forever, I just love doing it so much,” says Groff, who grew up in Ronks and graduated from Conestoga Valley High School in 2003.
“It’s going to be hard to leave, but it feels like it’s time.”
Part of his decision to leave is due to his starring role as Claude in the Shakespeare in the Park production of “Hair,” running July 22 through Aug. 17.
Last September, Groff, who got his start at the Ephrata Performing Arts Center and the Fulton Opera House, played the role in a special 40th anniversary concert in the outdoor Delacorte Theater in New York’s Central Park, where Shakespeare in the Park is staged.
“We did three performances and it was incredible,” Groff says. “We thought it was going to be a concert version, but it was fully staged with choreography. We had eight days to rehearse, and it was one of the most intense experiences in my life.”
Shakespeare in the Park and the Delacorte Theater have been home to many famous actors, including Sam Waterston, Natalie Portman, Kevin Kline and Michelle Pfeiffer.
Groff saw Meryl Streep there a few years ago in “Mother Courage and Her Children.”
Tickets are free, but they can’t be reserved. The lines at the Delacorte can be very long.
“Hair” revolutionized Broadway back in 1968 much the way “Spring Awakening” has done today.
“Without Hair,’ there would be no Spring Awakening,’ ” Groff says.
It was one of the first shows designed to appeal to young adults, it featured rock-oriented music, and it was about hippies opposing the Vietnam War. And it had an infamous nude scene.
All these years later, Groff says it’s still a powerful show.
“It’s definitely an anti-war musical,” he says. “It seemed kitschy, this strange, weird naked rock musical from the 1960s, but it hits people in a powerful way today. People were surprised how moved they were.”
Unlike his role in “Spring Awakening,” which required on-stage nudity, his character of Claude is the only one who keeps his clothes on in the show.
“When I told my mom I got the role, the first thing she said was, You don’t have to get naked, do you?’” Groff recalls with a laugh.
Another reason Groff decided to leave “Spring Awakening” was because a number of actors from the original cast have left the show, including John Gallagher, who won a Tony for best supporting actor in a musical.
“It’s been devastating when people leave,” Groff says. “We thought it would get easier, but it hasn’t.”
Groff’s co-star, Lea Michele, is leaving at the same time he is.
“We decided to do it together,” he says. “I don’t know if it will make it easier or harder.”
As much as he loves performing in “Spring Awakening,” Groff had a rough time last month, when he nearly got sick on stage during a performance, did become sick during intermission and then had to let the understudy go on for him.
He ended up missing several performances. Until that time, he’d never had to cancel a performance because of illness.
“It was really bad,” he remembers. “Really bad. I was throwing up for 48 hours.”
While Groff has “Hair” lined up for the summer, he will be – for the first time in a long time – unemployed after that.
“I have been auditioning non stop,” he says.
And there is the TV pilot he filmed several months ago called “Pretty Handsome,” in which he plays the son of a man (Joseph Feinnes) who’s decided to have a sex-change operation.
He’ll find out if the pilot was picked up some time in the next few weeks.
CONTACT US: jholahan@LNPnews.com or 481-6016
(c) 2008 Intelligencer Journal. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.