It’s the Sharks versus the Jets. It’s Tony and Maria who find instant dangerous love on a dance floor. It’s Leonard Bernstein’s incredible music with lyrics by a young Stephen Sondheim and book by Arthur Laurents and original choreography by Jerome Robbins.
It’s West Side Story (1957), that most American of musicals even though its source material of Romeo and Juliet was set in 14th Century Verona, Italy. And this powerful classic is about to open on Wortham Center’s stage in a Houston Grand Opera production with a stellar cast of singers and dancers.
Kyle Coffman, making his debut at HGO, is Riff, the leader of the Jets (he was in Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story as Ice and in Maestro) and says “There’s no substitute for the opera singers. I’ve worked with a lot of very talented singers in the musical/Broadway world and it’s a different entity when the opera singers are out there. You can feel the power of the voice.”
“It’s a pretty grand production. It’s really grandiose. It adds something to the play when it’s so voluminous. The sets are huge. and the balconies are up there.” And then there’s the memorable songs: :Tonight,” “America” and “Maria” to name just some of them.
Coffman is a fourth generation performer and a triple threat himself, a skill set he calls needed “if you’re going to do West Side Story.“
He comes from a long line of performers. “I’m a fourth generation showbiz performer in my family. So my great grandparents were on the vaudeville circuit. My grandparents performed in the Las Vegas area. My father was a ballet dancer and my mom a jazz. dancer so I always grew up in that world.
“My family were gypsies so I understood from a fairly young age what I was getting into. There’s opportunities to travel all around the world and meet amazing people. and do amazing works of art but in the pursuit of that passion for that art form you give up some things. You give up financial stability all the time and just a normal schedule all the time. I’ve been lucky enough to work and sometimes I’ve had trouble finding work. I think that’s just the fine print you sign that contract with. to be in the arts.
“One of my earliest memories was watching Ross Tamblyn do that back flip off the bar in the original West Side Story movie. For male dancers who have a ballet background you know Jerome Robbins in West Side Story you can’t really do better than that. So it’s been something I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of on occasion. I think it’s one of the best musicals ever written so it’s an honor and a privilege to get to do it.”
Asked to describe his character, Coffman says: “Riff is basically the Mercutio character. In our version, he’s leading a bunch of street kids, a bunch of ruffians. He’s the one who’s got a little bit more of a head on his shoulders than some of the other ones. He’s got a cool head and a little bit of that court jester attitude with the elders in his life. So there’s a little bit of merriment and that merriment barely covers the sort of deadly violence that can be brewing underneath.”
He’s been based in New York the last 20 years and has gone through several phases in his work. “I started out as just a dancer I went to the Joffrey Ballet School and started out doing just ballet, contemporary, modern. I always wanted to be an actor and I started taking acting classes and singing classes and then eventually I got to do musical theater. Now I’m trying to move on to maybe less dancing to save the old knees and the back and do some more acting. But there’s just nothing like being in the theater to me. It’s where I feel at home.”
He says he’s always been intrigued by TV and film and has learned to approach it in a far less linear way than the narrative arc of theater. In film he’s learned “to be present in every moment. There’s a million things happening behind the camera in your eyesight. You have to block that out; you have to stand perfectly.”
The West Side Story movie with Spielberg is his favorite movie experience. “You’re getting to see someone who’s a legend, who’s been at the top of his field since the early ’70s.”
He describes the time they were filming along a street in Harlem — its buildings had the look of a street in the ’50s — and a giant green screen was set up at the end of the street to block off the sight of more modern buildings. Suddenly Spielberg decided the street view needed to be five feet further back. “Instantly — no one was rolling their eyes —100 people moved all the cars and moved the screen back and we were ready to go.”
There were some added challenges in filming on actual streets rather than a soundstage, Coffman says. “As dancers we strive for a level of perfection that you can’t always get. Especially being out there in an urban environment, cobblestones, trash cans, bits of glass, rocks whatever. You kind of have to adapt to the terrain.”
He says he’s been lucky enough to do slightly different versions of this show a lot so I’ve taken and seen things from a lot of different people. “That’s part of the joy of being an artist, the collaboration.” and says this one is set in modern times.
“This one is set in present day which is really interesting because it shows how much the message is still relevant. placing it in modern times will do a lot for the audience to experience that and to think about the these issues we’re still dealing with today whether it’s bigotry, violence, immigration. They’re just as relevant as they used to be.”
” I honestly think it’s one of the great American works of art. It has something for everyone in a way. It has action and violence, excitement in that way. It’s got a. great love story and social themes that resonate today. I think it’s one of the best musicals ever written. It’s worth seeing live. You’re going to hear that orchestra playing some of the best music ever written,” Coffman says.
“There’s not a lot of musicals written nowadays that have this much, require this much from the dancers and the actors and the singers.”
Performances are scheduled for January 31 through February 15 at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday, Fridays and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sunday at the Wortham Center, 501 Texas. Sung in English with projected English text. On Saturday, February 15 at 7:30 p.m. the opera will have projections in Spanish. For more information call 713-228-6737 or visit houstongrandopera.org. $25-$255.
