Gay&Night Maart 2016

Interview / Kyle Dean Massey
It’s not often that a full-sized
Broadway show makes its way to
Amsterdam without being scaled
down. In fact, this might be one
of the rst times: Pippin will be
performed at Carré in March and
April. We were fortunate enough
to speak with hunky lead and
multi-talented Kyle Dean Massey.
So you grew up in Arkansas, right in the heart
of the American Bible Belt. What was that like
for you?
‘It was great while it was happening, I didn’t know
any different. Going back there now, it’s very
conservative, and a little backwards sometimes. You
go down there and you see a lot of confederate ags,
from the American civil war, which happened like 150
years ago. People still y the ag of the confederates.
That’s kind of weird. It was a small community to
grow up in. It was great; my friends and family were
wonderful, but as far as being an actor, there were
no resources for that in Arkansas. I didn’t come out
until I went to college. It would probably have been
a little bit more difficult to be ‘out’ if I had stayed in
Arkansas, but it’s not as if I’m closeted when I go back
there. I just don’t know that I would ever stay there.
I’m not going to say it’s a hostile environment, but it’s
not welcoming. There’s no reason for me to be there,
other than my family.’
Did you always grow up loving Broadway shows?
town, we didn’t have Broadway touring shows that
came through, people from my community didn’t travel
to New York to see Broadway shows frequently. So I
didn’t really know what they were. But I loved music,
and I loved the musicals that I saw as movies. I just
didn’t realize that something like Broadway existed.’
Were you familiar with the original
production of Pippin?
‘When I did my rst show in high school, I realized
I loved musical theater and wanted to know more
about it. So I went to the library and checked out cast
recordings of musicals they had there. They had a
cassette of Pippin, which I checked out when I was 16
or 17. So Pippin was certainly one of the rst Broadway
shows I knew of, and learned the words to.
Bob Fosse [legendary musical theater choreographer
and director - ed.] was involved in the original
production of Pippin, so it must have been pretty
minimalist in terms of sets and costumes. But the
version you’re performing in is quite the contrary,
right?
‘It is! I mean, it’s spectacular. I think the costumes in
our production are simple, but they’re amazing. They
were designed by Dominique Lemieux, who designed
the costumes for the Cirque du Soleil show O in Las
Vegas. They’re very opulent, gorgeous, form-tting
costumes. The show now takes place in a circus tent.
I think the set is completely beautiful, the way they
light it and create different spaces – I think it’s very
imaginative. It’s not an over-the-top scenic spectacle.
Compared to other Broadway shows I’ve done, it’s still
very sparse. It focuses on the story. I think the heart of
the original Bob Fosse show that was developed in the
70s is still there.’
‘As soon as I discovered it, yeah, but I can’t say I really
discovered it until I was a teenager. I lived in a small
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