The joys of musical theater won Michael Carter over last year, and he has plunged headfirst into training and performing. He's performing in "Broadway, Your Way," which wraps up this weekend at Theatre X. The Albuquerque native makes visual poetry films and music videos on the side. He dreams of attending grad school at the National Theatre Conservatory in Denver or of hitting the big time in New York.
Daily Lobo: So, is this what you want to do with your life?
Michael Carter: Originally, I got into sign language and musical theater. I wanted to interpret musical shows for the deaf.
DL: That's awesome.
MC: It pays pretty well, and it's a guaranteed job in New York, and it's a great way to network. But as I started studying musical theater more and more, I started pushing toward the performance aspect of it.
DL: So when did you realize you wanted to do the switchover from sign language to loud?
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MC: That was actually just last winter break. I was trying to double major and it was proving to be nearly impossible.. The sign language program here is extremely restricted, and it prefers if students are able to completely dedicate themselves to the sign portion. While I really wanted to be able to say, 'Yeah, I want to do just this and I want to completely throw myself into sign language,' I would have to cut out a very big portion of my life to do it, and it was just too hard.
DL: So, if you're signing for musical theater, is there something beyond just the words? Are you supposed to also be signaling the rhythm or the music?
MC: That is very interesting - that's something I want to study more. One of the biggest differences with interpreting music as opposed to interpreting conversation or lecture - what's the right way to put this? Sign language is extremely literal, and if you were interpreting the song "Baby Got Back," it would look very interesting because it would look like, "my baby has a backpack." That's what it would look like you're saying. Instead, you'd want to illustrate a beautiful woman with a large butt and grab it. You wouldn't use the sign for baby or the sign for back. It would just be awkward. So there's more interpretation in music. You have to be very metaphorical, and it's usually a very huge challenge interpreting music because music has very abstract things that's hard to convey in a literal sense.
DL: Do you train outside of school to keep yourself well-oiled as a performer?
MC: I take voice lessons. I've been taking them with Kathy Clawson for a couple months. She's out of state right now directing two different operas, so right now I'm not taking any voice lessons. Last summer I did a play with the theater North Fourth, an Irving Berlin revue show.
DL: Is there an underground musical scene? Are there underground musicals?
MC: You know, I'm sure there are. They happen all the time. There's what we call off-Broadway, which sometimes can be underground. Sometimes it can just mean it's a really big musical that's in L.A. There's one show that was previously done called "Zanna Don't" at Rodey (Theatre), which was never a huge hit. It was very independent, but it was still successful and it had kind of a cult following. When the audition notice went up for it, people that auditioned had no idea what they were auditioning for. They were like, "Have you ever heard of 'Zanna Don't?'" "Zanna what?" I didn't know. I wasn't in the department at the time. From my understanding it was an extremely independent type of production, and I'm absolutely positive there's all sorts of underground musical theater going on all the time.. Albuquerque has a very nice theater community for its capita.
