In Kiss Me, Kate, Stephanie J. Block Was Inspired by Elizabeth Taylor

Tony winner Stephanie J. Block just can't stop surprising her fans.

Be it developing the role of Elphaba in Wicked, breathing new life into the harried mother Trina at the center of Falsettos, or stepping into superstar Cher's shoes in The Cher Show, Block's vigorously detailed performances consistently uncover new layers of artistry.

When it was first announced the Block would be taking on the role of Lilli Vanessi in Kiss Me, Kate shortly after playing Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard and The Baker's Wife in Into the Woods, many theatre fans were pleasantly intrigued. How would Block, known for her soaringly powerful belt, inhabit a role typically typecast as a lyric soprano ingenue?

The answer? Incredibly, incredibly well. Block's performance, which netted raves across the West End, has been immortalized for an international film release, with screenings across the U.S., U.K., Ireland, Australia, and other selected international territories beginning November 17. In celebration of the release, Block sat down with Playbill for a wide ranging Q&A, covering everything from Kiss Me, Kate's 21st century resonance to her Wicked-ly endearing love story with husband Sebastian Arcelus, and how the art of making art is a form of resistance in the face of another Trump presidency.

This conversation has been edited and condensed.

Peter Davison and Stephanie J. Block in *Kiss Me Kate* Johan Persson

Well you've had quite the adventure since closing Kiss Me, Kate!
Stephanie J. Block: Inadvertently! Sebastian and I came out to Lake Tahoe, and we got stuck. It was the first blizzard of the season, all roads were closed. So, that was unexpected, but we're safe now.

What a way to cap off this last bit of life before the proshot's release.
Look, Mother Nature has things to say, and she says them big, loud, and proud. And I admire her for it.

How are you feeling, with the Kiss Me, Kate release right around the corner?
I haven't even seen it yet! But I have seen the rough copies, and I was able to give just a few little notes, which I know sounds a bit diva-esque, but it's so important. When you're in theatre, you get to control your own performance, and as a live theatre performer, it's very vulnerable to say, "Here's what I'm presenting on stage, hey film director I've never met before, good luck translating it!" That made me super nervous. So Bartlett Sher allowed me to take a sneak peek, as long as I didn't get too crazy. But I haven't seen the finished product!

Well, I think you'll be happy. Speaking as someone with a lot of love for Kiss Me, Kate, this production is clearly continuing the adaptation work Paul Gemignani and Michael Blakemore did to bring the show forward in 1999.
Oh, Paul. I love him so much. I call him the Miami Santa Claus because of those sunglasses and those Hawaiian shirts. He just like radiates that sort of magical Santa Claus energy...We started to have conversations right away, because, you know, we're not going to change Shakespeare. We're not going to change the source material of which the musical Kiss Me, Kate was written. Cole Porter took it in the 1940s, and made it what he thought would be this fun, raucous, backstage farce with wonderful music and crazy smart lyrics.

But yes, approaching that in 2024 is going to look a little different. As kind of a strong-willed and strong-headed woman, and as the mother of a nine-year-old daughter, I had thoughts and opinions and things to say if I was going to embody not only Kate, but also Lilli Vanessi, who I like a lot. I went to Bart, and said, "Talk to me. How are we going to mold this and shape this so that we're not kind of giving the middle finger to Cole Porter and Shakespeare, but make it so that it is much more palatable, grounded in reason and the understanding of where women are now?" And he said, "Well, what are you seeing?'" And I said, "I'm seeing myself as a 5'9'' woman who weighs in at about 160 pounds, and no one's going to easily push me over."

There is kind of a strength in who I already am, just in the way I poise myself, with the way I voice material, with the way I deliver lines. That, in and of itself, informs a brand new sort of Lilli and Kate. I also tend to kind of lean into the physical of every role, while mining the funny.

And when they cast Adrian Dunbar, who I love very much, he brought this Danny Kaye charm, this sort of lovable, bumbling aspect to Fred. So, you put his particular Fred with my particular Lilli, and it just makes for an understanding of this piece that the assaults are on both sides, because there's plenty that are going back and forth. This is a full-bodied sport between both he and I. The example that Bart gave me was The Taming of the Shrew with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, that kind of charged fighting that hides a real devotion.

Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor in *Private Lives* Martha Swope

Of course, Kiss Me, Kate is based on a similarly tempestuous couple to Taylor and Burton: Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne. Did you fold any of Lynn into your Lilli?
I kept myself separate from Lynn, but there was a lot, believe it or not, of Barbara Stanwyck. And during the comedy, I felt a little bit of Lucille Ball in my facial expressions. Barbara Stanwyck, Lucille Ball, and myself were the trifecta that I built this character on.

Everyone talks about the barbs that are traded between Fred and Lilli in this show, but focusing on that often means they're ignoring the tenderness that is traded as well.
I have to say, when I read the script and I saw that Lilli had kept the cork from their honeymoon wine bottle and a picture of him when he was two years old, I thought, "what really odd and very intimate things to keep and bring with her if they are completely estranged" She's not just there to help with the show, or to bring the show to success. She's not just there to help her own career. There is an undercurrent of "I have not released my love for this man." Love and hate are the same frequency of emotion. It's when you become complacent that you know the relationship is completely over.

So even when these two see each other, and there is this sort of crackle of dislike, even when they talk about hate and disgust, their love is of the same frequency, and that's what kind of fueled it for me.

We always romanticize relationships that break up. In "Wünderbar," they're going back to that place where they were young and fresh and building something together. And when you're in that headspace with someone— whether it's a friendship or lover or a business partner—you do align yourself. We were on the same page once.

And that's what led me into my "So in Love." I'm not going to a dreamy girl headspace. I'm going, "Damn it, I don't want to love this man. I know I shouldn't, for my own emotional and spiritual health. But damn it, I love this man, innately. I wish I could have a different answer, but here I am again, loving him, and I can't pretend like it doesn't exist."

Kiss Me, Kate may overtly be about Lilli and Fred's love story, but it's also a love letter to the people who make theatre.
Oh gosh, yes. Steven Ridley, our music director, I went to him and I said, "You know, I see that a lot of times when people are doing Kiss Me, Kate, 'Wünderbar' immediately comes flooding back to them. And that so musical theatre-esque, I would love to take these first couple lines like we're thinking back." We're really not sure before sense memory comes back and we just are off and running with exactly knowing what the lyrics were and what the choreography was.

It is this organic acting place we all know, this volleyball between us, like, "Do you remember?" "I do." "No, you don't." "That's not right." "Oh, here it is." We all do it. You jump right back into the stories with your fellow actors, whether those are success stories or war stories. You know your battle wounds from that production of Annie Get Your Gun in 1990, but you can't remember what you had for lunch today. That is a love letter, a little Valentine to all theatre performers out there.

This show is also, in some ways, a cautionary tale against showmances, and falling in love on the road. Of course, that doesn't seem to entirely be your opinion on the topic...
[laughs] I think it's a very human thing as artists.

As soon as we meet other people, we put ourselves in their shoes, and we start to understand and appreciate and fall in love with who they are. And then there is, of course, the talent crush, which is going to happen every single show. I don't care who you are and how committed you are, you can still recognize in somebody else that "Holy smokes, they illuminate on stage, they're crazy talented" thing. And my heart beats a little faster when I see that talent. That doesn't mean you're going to run away together, right?

A showmance is something very, very different from a talent crush, and I was always a little standoffish when it came to falling into any sort of showmance. But with Sebastian, it was undeniable. We recognized that each other was extraordinary, and that there was an attraction there. But it wasn't until I left the Wicked tour that he started really calling me. He had 10 more months with Wicked after I had left the tour, and he kept coming up with reasons to come back to the city, you know, to see his dentist or check on his apartment, and we'd connect each time. We had to get to know each other outside of the three hours in the magic black box, because you never know if you can sustain the messiness of life together once the curtain comes down.

That's usually not very successful, except for with one Sebastian Carlos Arcelus.

Sebastian Arcelus and Stephanie J. Block in *Wicked* Joan Marcus

Talking about show war wounds; this is certainly a very Wicked time in our industry. What is it like for you to witness this phenomena?
I celebrate it, and I have to say, I'm not surprised by it.

We're almost hitting 25 years of Wicked being a part of my musical theatre existence, and I think back to hearing those first three songs—"Making Good," "As Long as You're Mine," and "One Short Day"—sitting on a piano bench with Stephen Schwartz, they were immediately gripping to me. Mama, I just knew that this was going to take over. I knew it was going to be a global sensation. I'll always be so grateful to have been there at the beginning, and to know that my little voice was the first voice that ever put music to those lyrics.

And you know, I didn't necessarily cross the finish line in the way that I was hoping. I wanted to carry the torch forever, and be mother Elphaba, but it was Idina [Menzel]'s moment. Well, she's had many moments, but that was her moment to really shine. I will always carry my Elphaba as a personal and powerful compass. Wicked has given me so much, but as I always say, Idina got the Tony, but I got the Sebastian. Will there always be a little pang of what could have been? Of course. But it wasn't quite mine to cross the finish line to Broadway. And as Stephen Schwartz says, "No one will ever sing 'I'm Not That Girl' like you." Because in the end, it really wasn't me.

Oh man, you're breaking my heart all over again.
If you stick around long enough in this industry, you will have one of these stories. That almost, "it could have been" project. This is all just part of endurance and longevity in this beautiful industry. But yes, it's a heartbreaker.

While Elphaba is very outwardly an activist and a resistor, Lilli is also pushing back against oppression with the tools available to her as a strong woman in the 1940's. How does your Lilli wield that subtle power?
Both Adrian and I are not necessarily the age that you would typically think of casting. I used all of that, all of my knowledge of the world, the power that I yield because of the career that I've held, to inform that power dynamic Lilli has when she returns to the stage from Hollywood. Her wit, her physical strength in this particular version, those are powerful too, but she also has soft power. She has ingratiated herself with the cast. The cast actually really likes this woman, and sees this woman for who she is, and knows that she delivers the goods when she's on stage.

We established that she's worked with a lot of these people in the past, and therefore, they also know the reputation of Fred the philanderer. You see the support system going, validating that she has a reason to be this angry. I really can't stand when a woman is called a "crazy" for finally exploding and showing vulnerability while being upset. Because it's always because of a reason. There's something valid there, and I think this production allows the audience to see the validity of her frustration.

Adrian Dunbar and company of *Kiss Me Kate* Johan Persson

A lot of women, and other disempowered individuals, are really struggling with demoralization in the face of oppressive power right now. Lilli is living under a similar pressure to what Republicans are trying to rewind society to. How are you finding a way forward into this unknown future?
Oh, Margaret, it's a difficult thing.

I always believe that showing up is a sign of resistance. I really, really believe that. If we keep showing up, we are saying, "You cannot erase us. I am choosing." Which in and of itself is a freedom. I am choosing to not disappear. I am choosing to not be ignored. And I firmly believe that if our presence, constantly, is in the forefront, and we're constantly vocal—we will not be forgotten. I cannot allow anybody to take from me. I wallowed for a couple of days, but I cannot allow myself to feel demoralized. I do not have that freedom. My freedom comes from choosing to show up.

That's the power I have, that they can't strip away. And sure, right now I am saying it through a false grin and a slight tear in my eye, but we're going to do it one foot in front of the other. I hear you, and I see you, and I appreciate you, and all the women out there. Art is very powerful. Literature is very powerful. Dance is very powerful. We can't let them take that power away from us.

When you look back at the experience of Kiss Me, Kate, now that you are roughly two months out from the closing performance, what stands out in your memory?
At the very end, when she chooses to take off the hat, and she hands it to one of the female ensemble members. Every glance with every woman in that moment is a different sort of silent conversation that is being shared, whether it's Bianca or one of our beautiful female dancers or one of our featured performers. Every single woman has a different statement or question. And I love that moment, because it helps me sing this last bit where the words are actually contradictory to my body. I deliver these Shakespearian lines, because it really was a really beautiful, silent conversation between myself and the women of our company. We get through it together.

Other than the the proshot's release on November 17, where else can your fans find you in the coming months?
On November 19, if you download Cher's new memoir, you will hear me voicing her. I may not sound exactly as you're hearing me now, but it is a wild story. And if you enjoyed The Cher Show, you will absolutely enjoy part one of Cher's memoirs.