Composer Stephen Schwartz talks about ASCAP's musical theater festival and the 'Queen of Versailles'

The music of Stephen Schwartz has undoubtedly changed the world. But, with the closure of the Mark Taper Forum and the crisis in the Los Angeles arts scene, Schwartz, the award-winning songwriter and lyricist behind hit Broadway musicals and Disney movies including "Wicked," "Pippin," "Pocahontas" and "Enchanted," lamented the current state of commercial theater: "It's a pretty dark time right now. But there have been other dark times."

He continues, "After the pandemic, it's been hard for new, more adventurous work to get produced and find a foothold. It's all pretty safe right now from a commercial standpoint. There are a lot of brands out there…and it's pretty hard to get interesting, original work across."

Schwartz is in Los Angeles to talk about his latest venture, the ASCAP Foundation's Musical Theater Fest, where he served as artistic director. This is a two-week program including workshops for emerging composers, led by Schwartz.

It hopes to showcase not only up-and-coming composers, but also their talents in musical theater.

Schwartz shared that most people struggle with the same fundamental issues when writing a show. Time and time again, he stresses to them the importance of the basic elements of storytelling. "I've been doing this for a long time," he said. “The issues people have in developing their shows tend to be the same, which is how to structure a story, how to tell a story using music. These are the basic questions I ask myself every time I do a new project… Who do we care about? For whom do we support? What's the obstacle? Why should I, in the audience, care about your idea?"

As part of the program, Schwartz had the opportunity to evaluate new shows and choose featured composers. "I don't listen to entire scores, I don't read entire scripts, but what I try to assess is if it's a project that seems unusual, seems interesting, seems ambitious in terms of what it's trying to accomplish," he explained.

Schwartz is known for his inventive, far-reaching projects that span a myriad of genres, from the philosophical "Pippin" to the parables of "Godspell" to the upbeat fantasy of "Enchanted." He also talked about his new musical, "Queen of Versailles".

The show will reunite him with former "Wicked" Kristin Chenoweth, who originated the role of Glinda on Broadway. Their latest collaboration is an adaptation of Lauren Greenfield's 2012 documentary of the same name. It tells the story of billionaires David and Jackie Siegel. One of the things that excites him the most about this project is the opportunity to work with Chenoweth again.

"I love Kristin. I love working with her. She's extremely inventive," he said. "She's not just an actress who comes in and learns her music and learns her lines and performs them beautifully. She's very, very creative during the process of putting together a show and she has a lot of ideas and as a writer she reveals a lot to you. So it was a pleasure to relive that and work with her again. »

Schwartz is also inspired by the pertinent subject matter the musical tackles. "The social issues, economic issues and class issues that [Greenfield] explored in this documentary through the examination of this one family are very prominent in our society right now."

What inspires it? He cites a "long list" that includes, but is not limited to, Stephen Sondheim, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Bach, Carole King and Sting, and collaborators Alan Menken and Leonard Cohen.

"I always collaborate with other writers because I don't write my own books for musicals," he explained. "That's what I love about musical theater is that it's very collaborative, not just with the writers, but with the director, the designers and the actors. Everyone is playing in the sandbox and ideas are coming from everywhere. ONE...