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[0:00] Robert Bannon: Are you ready? It's The Roundtable with me, Robert Bannon.

[0:08] Robert Bannon: Listen, everybody. My name is Robert Bannon. You're listening to us on The Roundtable on Broadway World, the Broadway Podcast Network, iHeart, Spotify, wherever artists get their art. We have a brand new, fun, different, exciting. Whoo! It's Joe's Pub!, a place that is too cool to book me but not too cool to book our next guests.

[0:27] Robert Bannon: Okay. Look, do you go to therapy? I love therapy. I love my therapist. Not in a romantic way. I have made therapists fall asleep, which I think I'm way more entertaining than to be asleep. But if you love therapy, or you love the idea of therapy, or you feel like you're in love with your mother, then maybe Freud and this show is all for you. And if you love voices and incredible performers, well, then we've got something for you. Daniel. I don't want to mess up your last name, Daniel. Maybe you need to introduce yourself. I want to say it's Imand.

[1:00] Daniel Emond: That is a perfectly workable…

[1:04] Robert Bannon: That's a nice way of saying wrong.

[1:08] Daniel Emond: …of the francophonic Iman.

[1:11] Robert Bannon: Well, I'm from Jersey, so I'm way too trashy to have gotten that. But I love that. Joe Lampert, welcome to the show.

[1:24] Jo Lampert: Hey, thank you so much for having us.

[1:25] Robert Bannon: Joe, you look like you've got some trouble with your last name.

[1:28] Jo Lampert: Yeah, it's the francophone Lampert.

[1:31] Robert Bannon: Perfect. See, I definitely wouldn't have gotten that. Mine is Bannon. Thank you.

[1:36] Robert Bannon: Oh, so November 15th and November 22nd, you can get your tickets right now while we're talking about it. It's going to be at six o'clock. It's right there at Joe's Pub at the Public, and tickets are on sale. Go to the website. The link will be below. What is this show, Daniel?

[1:51] Daniel Emond: It's so funny. You sort of kicked us off by saying, I'm not in love with my therapist, because this story takes place in the early days of psychoanalysis, the time of Sigmund Freud and his protege, Carl Jung. And both of them had a relationship, a personal relationship with the main character. Her name is Sabina Spurine. So those first two you may have heard of. Most people know who Sigmund Freud is. But there was another very important pioneer of psychoanalysis, Sabina Spurine, who she was a hysteria patient. She was admitted for hysteria in Carl Jung's care. And something happened, and they had an affair. They had a relationship while he was treating her, which is why the sort of the logline for the musical is the dangers of telling your therapist, I love you.

So all that goes down. And meanwhile, Sigmund Freud is sort of mentoring Carl Jung, but then he becomes fascinated with Sabina Spurine, because she turns out to be a psychoanalyst herself, and they do a lot of work together. So it's kind of this triangle of a complicated triangle within the already very complicated psychoanalytic realm. They're also all, all of them are deeply obsessed with their dreams and dream life, which is that that's what most psychoanalysis sort of Freudian psychoanalysis begins with. What have you been dreaming of? Have you been dreaming of your mother, that kind of stuff. So it has this sort of dreams, and the sort of surrealism that exists, the surrealistic content that exists in the dreaming minds of these characters, are the motifs that play throughout the show.

[3:55] Robert Bannon: I learned so much, Joe, because my therapist used to ask me about my dreams all the time. I just thought he was weird, or she was weird. The one that fell asleep, by the way, that I loved, is, I mean, I haven't loved a woman in a long time. I have a husband. So I mean, maybe if it was, I mean, I don't, but that's just, I just want to put that out there, Daniel, just for the record. Joe, how did you hear about this? What made you say yes to this score and this story? And who do you play?

[4:20] Jo Lampert: Well, so I'm, so I mean, I think Daniel should get into this a little more, but Sabina, the sort of protagonist, as Daniel has laid it out to me, is played by multiple actors in the piece. Like a young Sabina, sort of a middle, older Sabina, and then like, finally, the person who's sort of looking back at her life, and ultimately, like, is sort of takes over the narration, like, three quarters of the way through, in some sense. Am I right on that, Daniel?

[4:48] Daniel Emond: So I'm playing the elder, because that's where I'm at now. I'm playing the elder Sabina.

[4:54] Jo Lampert: 40. The character is 40.

[4:56] Daniel Emond: Great. Matching age. But yeah, so it's interesting. You know, I said yes, actually, like, before ever even hearing a tune, because I think Daniel's a genius. I worked with him quickly and briefly on one of his other pieces, Kill the Whale, about Moby Dick, an adaptation of Moby Dick, a brilliant adaptation. And somebody couldn't do one of the workshops, and they needed sort of a replacement for that moment. And I was lucky enough to get to be in that workshop. And I find it so thrilling working on new work. I find it thrilling to work on hard work, work that music that is hard, that is just like, gets at you, and you can't, I still don't not sing no song. I wake up with them in my head. And they're very, they infect you, what Daniel writes.

And I think, so as soon as he mentioned that he had another project with, you know, a protagonist, or even a third of a protagonist that I might be able to sing, I said yes, immediately. Because I think that Daniel's music is so guttural, and raw, thrilling, and a challenge. And so for me, that's like the ultimate place to start working from.

[6:09] Robert Bannon: I love that. That's Joe, everybody. I mean, Joe was in Joan of Arc at the Public. Joe has received a Lortel Award nomination. She was in Chicago playing Mary Magdalene. She's been on television. She tours with a band. She does a little bit of everything. And now she's going to be there singing, and skelton, and belting this score for you right there at Joe's Pub. So have a drink, have a little, I don't know, charcuterie board that they sell there, and enjoy the evening. Daniel, you, sir, are no slouch yourself. You have won all sorts of fancy awards. You're a Jonathan Larson Grant recipient. You created Kill the Whale. You're a member of the Joe's Pub working group. How do you go from Moby Dick to Freud?

[6:51] Daniel Emond: Good question.

[6:53] Daniel Emond: Yeah. The material that I have devoted decades, well, a decade and a half of my creative life to is, the source material is stuff that, like the same language that Joe just used, it's stuff that gets at you, that won't leave you be. That's how I feel about Moby Dick, which is the source for my first musical. And that's how I feel about dreams and dreaming, which I've been fascinated with since I was little, this thing that humans have been doing forever. And we basically, you know, like 100,000 years or so of us being humans, we've been doing it, and we are no closer to understanding them, really. And so my fascination with dreams led me very quickly through the pipeline. It's the direct pipeline to Freud and Carl Jung and then Sabina Spurian, all these people who were similarly obsessed with dreams and dreaming.

And Freud, in my view, Freud's great hubris was that he felt like he had figured it out, that for hundreds of thousands of years, 100,000 years, humans have had no idea what dreams were. And Freud was like, I know what they are. And that's his Achilles heel, in my opinion. And that's very much at play in the piece.

[8:27] Daniel Emond: So yeah, Freud has fascinated me since 2019, when I started working on it. And I have, it's taken a few forms since I started working on it, it began as just kind of a meditation that was very abstract and didn't have really much character to it. And then Freud and Jung became characters in it. And I cycled through different protagonists until I landed on Sabina Spurian, who's actually been, there's a Hollywood movie by David Cronenberg called A Dangerous Method with Keira Knightley, who plays this character. I'm not going to say what I think of that movie. But I will say that I don't think she's been properly, her story has not been properly told. And especially her fascination with dreams, which really connects her to these other characters.

So that's what the, she has been the protagonist and the sort of anchor of her life has been the anchor of this, this music that I've written for the last two-ish years. And which is about how long I've known Joe, maybe not quite like we've known each other so briefly. And yet, I feel like we've, I know, we've been through such a beautiful ringer.

[9:51] Robert Bannon: Talk DREAM!

[11:10] Jo Lampert: I get an accompaniment track for it so that I can practice alongside with no other voice. I get a plunk track where I hear my notes played. And then I just, I try to practice a little bit every day and kind of start to, not to like use the word too much, but dream on it and let it get into my psyche. And you know, what's great is we can use our sheet music. This is not like an off book, you know, musical presentation, but of course when you're performing, you want to be able to get at that electricity. So you want to be as familiar with the music as you can. I also have a big rap moment in this, which is like its own whole thing. I probably haven't rapped live since like, you know, 2009. So you know, that's one of Daniel's strong points, actually, he's a brilliant spoken word rap writer.

And so it's interesting this character gets to kind of have a come to Jesus moment with a rap. So it's like just really getting into your bones, you know, it's again, it's not really having to memorize is not the point of this exercise. But I also wanted to chime in and say something Daniel told me about how this connects to Kill the Whale is he said to me, Freud is kind of an Ahab like figure in our culture and collective unconscious. And in some ways, dreams are his white whale. You know, it's like he thinks he's gonna get it, you know, but like he doesn't, you know. So anyway, I thought that was interesting.

[12:27] Daniel Emond: Joe played Ahab, Captain Ahab in the Kill the Whale last year.

[12:35] Jo Lampert: Yeah, yeah, totally. Another thing I wanted to mention was that with the greatly reduced rehearsal time, our Sitzprobe is going to be our only band rehearsal with band. I mean, luckily, these musicians are world class, but for any actors who do musicals, who might be listening in, I just want to say, Joe reaching out to me to be like, can we can we meet beforehand to learn to work on on this stuff? This material is like a composer's dream is for actors to, to feel that investment. Obviously, we're all everyone in this industry is running around, you know, so freakishly busy. But if you can carve out the time to really dive into new, fresh material, you know, emerging writers, you know, new writers of new work, musicals, whatever, it's it certainly makes them feel, feel, feel the love.

[13:37] Daniel Emond: No, please.

[13:38] Jo Lampert: No, this is your chat. With Daniel's work, and I think and then you can correct me if I'm wrong, because I don't quite know how you sort of write it all down and record it. But a lot of Daniel's songs are very, they're kind of like, I would call them riff heavy, but they're not just riffs for the sake of riffing. It's very guttural. It feels like Daniel's like singing from his soul, and then like recording it. And then someone's like writing out what those riffs are, and they become sort of the god of the music. So in that regard, I think it's also really cool in this process to have Daniel actually sing and kind of I ghost sing it so that I can really get inside of like, what was he trying to get at?

Because on the page, it can look a little wily, because it's like, wait, what are you singing? You know, but it comes to him so viscerally and naturally. So it's, it's not even about imitating Daniel's riff, but the riff is the music. So it's sort of trying to get inside of it by hearing him do it. He has these great demos for this, as well as for Kill the Whale, there was an incredible album that he made. And that has been, like, you know, key to listen in, you know, to really listen and know what he was getting at, you know?

[14:45] Daniel Emond: It sounds incredible. It sounds like it's smart. It sounds like it's fun. It sounds like it's going to be entertaining. It sounds like the music is diverse and interesting. Who else? You get to play Freud. And who else is joining this party?

[14:56] Daniel Emond: Well, you know, speaking of being a singer and composer, not all musical theater composers are singers themselves. And one of the double edged swords of me being a singer and singing the tunes is I meet the best singers ever to bring it to life. And Joe is just that, one of the best singers ever. I've been a fan for years. Other performers in the show are Ellie Barone, who plays Sabina in her earliest sort of part of the story. Samantha Polly, who plays the in between Sabina Spielrein, Jordan Bolden, who plays Carl Jung, all, yeah, tremendous vocalists and performers and it's a small ensemble, but it's a very, very powerhouse heavy ensemble.

[15:56] Jo Lampert: Y'all are gonna be singing, you got some singers up there.

[16:00] Daniel Emond: We are gonna be singing.

[16:02] Jo Lampert: So who do you hope comes to see the show? Who do you, after hearing the music and the subject matter, who, every human being in the world and who, is it a date night? Is it something that you feel like it's for people who love theater? Is it for people who have, you know, want to get into therapy issues? What, are you going to take my insurance card? Tell me, who do you think should go see this, Joe?

[16:23] Jo Lampert: Well, I feel like that's a really good question. I mean, I do think anybody can access this because I think it is touching on something that we all literally deal with, which is dreams and the unconscious and the subconscious. Obviously, I think everyone could benefit from therapy, but I was going to say, like, I think for people who are trying to sort of expand their minds as to what musical theater might sound like, what it might mean to make a musical, people who want to hear, like, like a show that could travel as, like, as I feel about Kill the Whale as well, like, a concept album band cycle, like, you want to come for, like, a band and a night, like, a concert. Like, you are hearing reverb, you are hearing texture, you know, like, you are, you're looking for maybe something.

And also, this is not lyrically, like, A to B, and I understand exactly, it's like, you're, you're wanting people who are, like, willing and ready to like, go on the ride and pay attention and kind of get a little psychic and freaky. So that, those are, that's, that's what I'm thinking. What do you think, Daniel?

[17:26] Daniel Emond: Yeah, I think so. I think, I think so just, just as well. And Robert, just so the listeners understand, this isn't just one guy, me, at a piano, and four singers. We have, as Joe said, our wonderful music director, J.T. Kaufman, and I will be taking turns at the piano. We have synthesizers, we have electric bass, electric guitar, shredding some electric guitar. We have a string section, we have violins, cellos. So this is the Joe's Pub stage. For those who've been, it's going to get some love tonight, it's going to get some weight on it. It's going to be an absolutely packed stage. There will be musicians falling off the stage. There's going to be a saxophone player, it's, it's, it'll be a big night.

[18:10] Jo Lampert: It's November 15th and November 20th.

[18:12] Daniel Emond: That's right. The 15th and the 22nd, tickets are already flying out the door. It's at six o'clock. They're only 42 bucks. You can't even get an Uber to the theater for $42. So get somebody, bring a friend, tell everybody to get, gather around, invite your therapist, tell them you love them and bring them to the show. And that ethically may be a problem, but whatever. They were all sleeping with each other. So who's talking about ethics?

[18:35] Robert Bannon: And you can get yourself a ticket and see the show. We'll be following you guys, we'll be sharing this to everybody, if you know somebody who loves theater and is in New York, let them know about it, invite them. And then what do we hope to do after this, Daniel? I know this is just the beginning.

[18:49] Daniel Emond: Yeah, I've got some cool industry folks who are going to come and be excited to hear their feedback. And, you know, as Joe said, I think this piece has a life as a concert piece. I'm recording the whole thing as a concept album as well. But it's being written as a musical, which you won't hear all the full book scenes in the show. These nights are about the music, but you'll hear the songs with some context around them. But yeah, we hope to develop it further as a full two-act musical.

[19:30] Robert Bannon: Can't wait. Let's go. Congratulations to you both. Break legs, have an incredible run. Thank you for being here. My show's your show anytime.

[19:36] Jo Lampert: Thank you so much.

[19:37] Daniel Emond: Thank you, Robert.

[19:38] Jo Lampert: So great to hang with you.

[19:39] Daniel Emond: So great to hang with you.