Katie Rose Clarke was about nine months pregnant with her third child when she got the call to audition for Broadway’s “Merrily We Roll Along,” which is now playing at New York’s Hudson Theatre after a 2022 off-Broadway run.
Clarke spent much of that early tryout “hoping and praying” that the musical’s creative team would “see past my pregnant belly and be able to envision me” in the show. But being on the brink of welcoming daughter Mabel Anne into the world may have helped the actor and singer tap into the raw emotions of her character, a young mother whose once-blissful marriage splinters on account of her husband’s infidelity.
“If this project had come along at any other point in my life or career, it might not have been right for me,” Clarke told HuffPost. “I kept thinking: ‘This is a role I want to play, and I feel so right for it.’ I have young kids. I’m a mom. This is the right role for me at the right time.”
Told in reverse chronology, Stephen Sondheim’s musical focuses on Frank (played by Jonathan Groff), Charley (Daniel Radcliffe) and Mary (Lindsay Mendez), a trio of ambitious Manhattanites who become best friends as young, creatively minded adults yet end up bitter and estranged by middle age.
Clarke’s character, Beth, meets Frank when he is a struggling musician performing at a downtown nightclub. The two marry and become parents to a young son (played by Rocco Van Auken at the March 26 performance). It isn’t long, however, before Frank abandons his artistic goals in favor of a fast track to wealth and fame and becomes entangled in an affair with Gussie Carnegie (Krystal Joy Brown), the star of a new show he’s written.
As Beth, Clarke gets to deliver the musical’s heart-wrenching centerpiece, “Not a Day Goes By.” Despite the heartbreak Beth experiences over the course of the show, Clarke and director Maria Friedman were adamant that her delivery of the ballad be more tender than tragic, to avoid the character being seen as a victim.
“What makes Beth so powerful is how wholly and selflessly she loves Frank,” Clarke said. “She’s incredibly selfless and brave. She moves from Houston to New York by herself. She goes all in on her relationship without fear. She defies her parents to marry him — and this is the 1950s.”
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When it comes to performing “Not a Day Goes By” specifically, she adds: “I don’t think it should be the same night after night. Because I have such a safe scene partner in Jonathan and excellent material, I can be free within that and just let the ride happen for myself. When people tell me they came to see the show, I have no idea what version of the song they saw.”
As many Broadway historians can attest, the original production of “Merrily We Roll Along” was a colossal flop when it premiered on Broadway in 1981, closing after just 16 performances and 44 previews. The New York Times described the show’s tone as being “as empty as its characters,” noting: “What’s really being wasted here is Mr. Sondheim’s talent.”
Forty-three years later, the “Merrily We Roll Along” revival has turned out to be a critical and commercial smash. Clarke, for her part, has a few thoughts on why the musical has been positively reevaluated 43 years later.
“I don’t have the baggage of what that first production was, because I don’t know much about it myself,” she said. “But in this day and age, interpersonal, face-to-face friendships and experiences are less frequent. So people who come to the show walk away feeling introspective and taking stock of the choices they’ve made in their lives.”
A Texas native, Clarke made her Broadway debut in 2005 when she succeeded Kelli O’Hara in the Tony-winning musical, “The Light in the Piazza.”
Since then, she’s returned to the Great White Way in 2015’s “Allegiance,” starring Lea Salonga and George Takei, as well as the 2017 revival of “Miss Saigon.” Prior to “Merrily We Roll Along,” Clarke’s most recent stint on Broadway was in 2019 as Glinda in “Wicked,” a role she first played on tour in 2007 and in New York three years later.
Even with that impressive résumé to her credit, Clarke views “Merrily We Roll Along” as a “once-in-a-career” experience.
“Every show is a surprise,” she said. “I have three kids, so I’m just Mom most of the time. To be part of something that’s moving and changing people … I’m just thankful for the opportunity. If I can keep working, as well as having the gift of motherhood and having a family, my cup is really full.”