Happy New Year everyone! “Un-Block The Music” was absent for the second half of 2023 because I am working on the never ending project that is my book about Women In Theater. What is difficult about “giving birth” to this book is that I have found so many interesting people and interesting topics to write about, I can’t stop interviewing!!! Case in point, Rebekah Greer Melocik and Nicole D’Angelo.
Rebekah, not only wrote the book, but she wrote the lyrics for How To Dance In Ohio, which opened at the Belasco Theater December 10. What made me so intent on speaking to her is because this is the first Broadway show with autistic characters played by autistic actors.
Adapted from Alexandra Shiva’s 2015 HBO documentary, the show follows challenges faced by a group of autistic young adults at a counseling center in Ohio. With the support of a clinical psychologist, the center arranges a spring formal dance and encourages them as they encounter love, fear, stress, excitement, and hope.
Rebekah said, “I was lucky enough to be on this project from the very beginning.” About 6 years ago, composer Jacob Yandura got the rights for the documentary. “We were lucky to get a producer and a director from the very beginning.” The show was developed by Harold Prince, but sadly he passed away in 2019. Sammi Cannold came on as director right before shutdown in March 2020. Sammi, making her Broadway debut, is one of Forbes magazine’s “30 Under 30 in Hollywood & Entertainment” and one of Variety’s “10 Broadway Stars to Watch.”
“We developed our first draft of the musical with Harold,” said Rebekah. Then Jacob and I used lockdown as an incubation period to work on the next draft. We did our first table read in October 2021.” In June 2022, there was the next workshop and that is when Nicole came onto the project as music assistant. But, Nicole is so much more than that. “I am an actor, music director, and multi-instrumentalist. I play piano, woodwinds, and about 20 other instruments. I am Autistic, non-binary (she/they), and queer aroace.” At the writing of this piece, Nicole is a script advisor as well as music assistant and is in the process of preparing to conduct the show.
(Pictured: Rebekah Greer Melocik)
How did casting directors find Nicole? “I actually auditioned for the show in 2021 for what was going to be the October workshop. My audition was ‘I Speak Six Languages’ from The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. I rewrote it…to ‘I Play Six Instruments!’ I submitted it too late, so nothing came out of that. I was so devastated because I knew it was going to be a very special project,” Nicole said. Then in April 22, Nicole got a call from a music supervisor. “He said they were interested in hiring an autistic music assistant. and they remembered me. The rest, as they say, is history.”
“This show has a lot of good will behind it and a lot of serendipity,” Rebekah said. Nicole agreed. “Overall, before the pandemic, there wasn’t such an emphasis on authentic casting. I don’t think people recognized the value of it as much as they do now as marginalized groups have been empowered by movements such as Black Lives Matter. We now have much more of a voice and a say in who gets to tell our stories.”
Rebekah remembered. “When we started in 2017, there were people along the way that thought we would never be able to find 7 autistic actors. We found 100; enough to cast the show over and over again! What is really exciting is that we always suspected there were actors out there that felt they could not be open about being autistic.” The stigma has softened. “I also have Tourette’s Syndrome. While people who knew me always knew I was neurodivergent, it wasn’t something I talked about for the same reason.”
(Pictured Nicole D’Angelo)
It has taken Rebekah 17 years to get her Broadway break; both she and Jacob are from Ohio! “It took a long time to get here, but I feel lucky. I think there is a reason I made it to Broadway with this show. This was a mission focused producing team. The priorities are slightly different than we would have gotten with other Broadway projects. We have a few words that our community believes in…’belonging’ and ‘advocacy’. I have never walked in a room where there is such grace,” Rebekah said.
“Un-Block The Music” hopes this story has whet your appetite and you want to see this show…If so, go to https://www.telecharge.com/Broadway/How-to-Dance-in-Ohio/Ticket for tickets.
Un-Block The Music 
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