From The Top! A Musical Theatre Podcast

Mary and Steven cover Ruthless: The Musical in this week's episode of From The Top!, now illegal to be produced in Tennessee! Support Trans Individuals and the life-affirming medications they will soon be denied to live as their full authentic selves. Support Drag Queens and Kings for their fearless community leadership. Support Adult Workers in their offered services we as a society demand, yet t...

(Sung with gusto and blatant misogynistic vibrato) OKLAHOMA!!!!! Mary and Steven are BACK! They pick up where they left off and critique their coverage of the classic musical in this week's Show Notes episode of From the Top! on Oklahoma! Steven takes a deeper look into Lorenz Hart and his sordid tale of why he left this show to set the stage and the birth of theatre's feel-good duo and still has...

Get ready for tap dancing cowboys, "smelling salts" that make you hallucinate in ballet, and a place $50 goes a long way, well... at least it did back in 1907. It's Oklahoma! In this week's episode of From the Top! Mary and Steven take a surrey ride through this musical that deals with a lot more than they prepared for. Mary has a few questions and some bones to pick about the overall tropes of ch...

***Please consider a donation to the Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS Foundation.*** DONATE HERE Find Testing Sites near you, and info on PrEP - CLICK HERE If love is a quantifiable unit, Mary and Steven have found it in this week's installment of Show Notes, continuing their coverage of the cultural phenomenon that is RENT from last week's episode of From The Top! Blonde moments abound for Steve...

***Please consider a donation to the Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS Foundation.***   DONATE HERE   Find Testing Sites near you, and info on PrEP - CLICK HERE Sabrina is back, so you better MOOOOO with her!!! I n this episode of From The Top! Mary and Steven have Sabrina back in the booth to take a look into a 90's cult classic musical that changed a generation of theatergoers, RENT ....

The champagne keeps flowing (just don't tell no coppers, see) at the Tottendale Estate as Mary and Steven continue their journey of the raucous comedy that hosts its own musical, The Drowsy Chaperone in this week's Show Notes Episode of From the Top! Steven fills in the blanks (not from a blackout, thank goodness) with a light Notes From a Director segment, flows into an Actors Nightmare that isn'...

Mary and Steven want to wish everyone a happy holiday season, no matter your beliefs and make a point to say it's the small things this time of year, not the dollar amount spent making rich people richer. They give a quick and fun Quick Cast of Judas and Jesus, and finally, drop the next fun show to be covered over everyone's winter break. Happy listening! FOLLOW US! For all the latest content and...

Our quadruple of sinners and/or saints are back in the second installment of From The Top! covering Jesus Christ Superstar . In this episode, Mēghan Scott and Sabrina Malecek join Mary and Steven once more to tell all the fun variations and empowering moments that performing a gender-unlocked version of this show entails, including chauvinistic statements from certain auditioners, awkward audience...

Steven and Mary must have been inhaling the fumes of Tromaville, because this week's episode of Show Notes is laced with some zany and heartfelt notions as they go over their episode of The Toxic Avenger: The Musical. Corrections are made, then Steven brings up some toxic traits this show brings to the forefront, and Mary makes life-changing connections to ideas and characteristics this show spews...

If you gather around your family's table, chosen or biological, you can always say how thankful you are to have your favorite musical theatrecast and review in your life this year and into the next. If you find yourself having a perfectly peaceful thanks-living staycation, catch up or relisten to past episodes while that microwave meal is thawing, and laugh, get mad, disagree, and sing along throu...

Smell the fumes and put on your hazmat suits. Mary and Steven are taking you to the dank and polluted Jersey shores of Tromaville in this week's episode of From the Top! with The Toxic Avenger: The Musical . Steven faces the severely chemically burned fact that he may actually like this romp through their smallest cast show to date. Mary takes the reins, diving into the history, and poses some sto...

It's Mary and Steven's first crossover episode at From The Top! They are joined by the one-of-a-kind and magical in every way human, Jon Reilly, host of Lifes's But a Song podcast. They load up on chocolate frogs and butterbeer to dissect and enjoy StarKid Productions' first foray onto stage with A Very Potter Musical. Jon keeps Steven on his toes like Ron dodging a whomping willow's limbs, sharin...

Mary and Steven are back! And they have some director notes Julian Marsh himself would have had an over the top fit over in this week's episode of From The Top! Show Notes for 42nd Street . Steven nitpicks the details of production life and how it's portrayed in all the shows variations, while Mary brings comedic relief showing just how this show holds a mirror up to show life in all it's crazy. T...

Tighten those pieces of metal on your shoe soles and learn the Broadway and a few time steps for this next episode of From The Top! Where Mary and Steven take a look at the show that birthed many tropes on shows about shows, 42nd Street . Steven paints the era of the depression with some history of the show finding some new source material to put forth, and Mary, without asking permission, touches...

Steven and Mary continue the conversation about Pippin like they’re a part of the traveling troupe's final dress rehearsal, and it's verging on 1am. They have some Notes from a Director, making the necessary adjustments for a solid performance, then get on stage just to have an Actor's Nightmare, digging deep into the psyche of Pippin and Fosse. After a quick recasting, they travel to a magical la...

The magical mural hath froze over my dudes, dude-ettes, dude-adjacents, and non-dudes. Steven and Mary… disagree HARD. [Insert your best shock-horror face here] Meanwhile, corrections abound as Steven critiques, like he do, even more, drops some Gene Kelly history, and sprinkles a few fun facts. Mary brings the popular opinion to the forefront having just watched the cult classic film, getting dee...

As they tighten their skate wheels, and tease their hair, Mary and Steven tackle their most controversial show to date, Xanadu! Loved by few, hated by many, this Box Office flop turned Broadway Stage Smash probably even turned Greek deities heads, and caused some infighting. Steven dives into what and where Xanadu may harken from, and Mary finds humanity in devilish and quirky characters within th...

In another installment of Show Notes! Steven cancels source material again even harder than Columbus Day, takes inspo from Earth day and cleans up some previous musings presented, and Mary gets to dive into a brand new segment, “11th Hour Diva-Cast”, and watches Steven sweat harder with remembering names than point blank being asked the difference between a yam and a sweet potato. Happy listening!

This week Mary and Steven stay at a little farmhouse in the middle of nowhere Connecticut… AND THEY LOVE IT! Source material takes a backseat this week to uplift the voices that should be heard, all while feeling the spirit of the holidays in this reimagined take on a classic, feel-good story. So plant a tree, dye some eggs, and cut the fruit cake while the turkey roasts and the fireworks boom in...

If you listen real hard, you’ll hear the faint crushing of beer cans on foreheads and squeaks of antennas being fiddled with trying to see the 800 number on QVC in this edition of Show Notes! Corrections are made, along with apologies. Then Mary reaches all the way to the bottom of the pork rind bag to get more in depth with our cast of characters, as Steven brings out the hard stuff, and it ain’t...

The Phantom of the Opera still has some mysteries to unfurl. How does Christine get vocal lessons through walls? Does Opera and Punk Piano work together? Why is Gerard Butler so sexy as a creepy phantom man? Join Mary and Steven while they visit these questions, give corrections and clarify even more, in another installment of Show Notes! Enjoy.

Enjoy as Steven and Mary in this redone episode drop of Andrew Lloyd Webbers "masterpiece" Phantom of The Opera. Steven did double time and read a book, watched every version of this possible, and has cast albums haunting his dreams. Mary finds the heart in the love story and has some hot thoughts about some of the cringe characters we find in this show, and keeps Steven wrangled on the...

In this week's plus sized minisode, Mary has just seen the John Waters version of Hairspray, and the opinions twist harder than Corny’s dancers. Join Steven eating some of his words while Mary’s blood boils over the “real” Amber, as they dive even deeper into the iconic characters, the fight for racial equality still happening today, and personal cautionary tales from this sock-hoppin musical, Hai...

Corrections are a b*tch of living, which Steven and Mary find out in this episode premiering the From The Top! Minisode series Show Notes fixing “dropped lines” aka “content” missed, explore more “from the wings” insight, and even enter a magical land called “What If”, all while deep diving more into the Tony Award winning hit that literally rocked Broadway, Spring Awakening .

In this pilot episode, Mary and Steven talk about the show that brought them together, and one that changed the landscape of Broadway. What is a “Purple Summer” anyway? Spring Awakening gets taken From the Top!