Schele Williams (‘The Notebook’ and ‘The Wiz’) makes her historic Broadway directorial debut by telling stories ‘with authenticity and integrity’ [Exclusive Video Interview]
“I’ve been directing for 20 years, and to finally have this moment happen is just extraordinary,” confesses Schele Williams. While she has previously appeared on Broadway as an actor, she suddenly finds herself making her Broadway directorial debut with not one, but two musicals within the same season. Her efforts on “The Notebook,” which she co-directed with Michael Greif, and a jubilant revival of “The Wiz” mark a historic moment for representation on Broadway. As Williams puts it, “It’s the most incredible feeling ever.” Watch the exclusive video interview above.
“The Wiz” is a deeply personal venture for Williams, having fallen in love with the national tour when she was seven years old in Ohio. “It was the first time I had seen a piece of theater in which every cast member was Black, and it was a story that I knew, but suddenly I was inside that story,” she explains. “Then I played Dorothy when I was a senior in high school, so I got to really get inside the show in a new way. Now, all these years later, this is the greatest gift of my life, being able to continue this extraordinary legacy.”
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In order to capture the same magic that enchanted her as a young girl, Williams focused on the deep truth’s of Dorothy’s journey. “It’s a story about…her learning how to be brave, her learning how to trust, to find her tribe,” reveals Williams. “These are all things that we all go through, and at the end of the day, what she discovers about herself is, I think, an awakening that many of us have many times in our life.”
When it came to the decades-spanning romance in “The Notebook,” Williams and Greif cast three actors of different races to play each of their two leads at various ages. So the oldest version of Allie is played by Maryann Plunkett, who is white, while the middle version of the character is portrayed by Joy Woods, who is Black. This conceit allows every audience member to experience the universality of the emotions on stage, and the directors sell it by beautifully aligning the performers through movement at key points in the story. “There are these moments that inside you, intrinsically, you get all of these feelings that remind you of another epic moment in your life. So it felt very natural that they would sync up,” Williams explains. “I look at pictures of myself or old videos, and I do some of the same gestures that I did when I was like five. So these are all beautiful observations of real life and how connected our soul is to who we are.”
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Making her Broadway debut with two shows would be enough of a thrill, but Williams is also making history as the first Black woman to direct a Broadway musical in nearly 50 years. In fact, she is only the second Black woman to ever direct a musical on Broadway. The only other person in this exclusive club is Vinnette Carroll, who was Tony nominated for “Your Arms to Short to Box With God” in 1976. “I couldn’t believe it,” exclaims Williams of the disheartening statistic, “it’s bananas.”
She admits that she had been “chasing” director Debbie Allen (who has only ever directed plays on Broadway) her entire career, so she knows how important her moment of representation is for the theater community. “I’m so honored to be working on shows that I love so deeply. And I do believe that having a Black woman in the position has made the pieces richer and more thoughtful,” explains Williams. “I think going forward, when Black women are at the center of shows, it is important to have Black women behind the table to tell the stories with authenticity and integrity.”
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