Songs For Nobodies

People’s Light’s 2019/2020 season was, of course, cancelled halfway because of COVID. They got through about half the run of Shakespeare In Love, and that was that. There were a lot of great shows in the line up that season, and I was sad to see them go. Luckily, some of the shows were given another chance. Hold These Truths and Bayard Rustin Inside Ashland were both in the 2021/2022 season. And when I heard that Songs for Nobodies, the show I was most looking forward to in that season, would be on in this season, I was ecstatic.

The idea behind Songs for Nobodies is easy enough. Five influential, legendary women singers, and the women they cross paths with. But the show is so much more than that. It’s a one woman show, which, as I’ve said before, is extremely difficult. And remember, this woman is playing each singer, and each woman she meets. That’s ten characters in 90 minutes. And she’s singing.

Belting out musicals in the kitchen while I’m cooking is one thing. I can stop to take breathing and water breaks. Bethany Thomas doesn’t get that. She’s pushing right through from story to story, singer to singer. Each singer is famous for what she sings, such as Patsy Cline singing country and Billie Holiday singing the blues. Judy Garland, Patsy Cline, Edith Piaf, Billie Holiday and Maria Callas are all somebodies in their own right. Bethany Thomas plays all of them.

Was I blown away? I was so blown away. The show was everything I expected and more. I’m not entirely sure what I was thinking going in. I knew the basic idea of the show, but I definitely didn’t realize the scale to which it went. These are singers I’ve known forever. These are singers most people have known forever. And watching someone embody all those different genres of music was insane. To be able to go seamlessly from one to the next must have taken so much energy, and so much passion. This is definitely something that most people would not be able to do.

Okay, so I’ve talked about the somebodies. Now I need to talk about the nobodies. I mentioned above that these stories with these singers involve ordinary women that they meet (with the exception of Edith Piaf, but I’ll get to that in a bit). These are the women behind the scenes, women who don’t always have glamorous jobs. The encounters between these women and the singers vary drastically. But the common thread is that these famous women, who don’t have to be nice to anybody, treat the “nobodies” with respect and care. They have normal conversations with them…Patsy Cline invites an usher to sing behind her. You really see that these women are extraordinary in more ways than one.

The one different story was Edith Piaf’s. The story is told by a woman, but the story is about how Piaf saved her father. Here’s a bit of history (I love history) that I didn’t know…Edith Piaf would sing for Nazi/German audiences, as well as prison camp audiences, and often help prisoners escape. Like, how fucking cool is that? The story we hear about her is how she saved this woman’s father. We get one of my favorite lines in the show from this one- “If my father died before my birth, would I have existed and who might I be?”

In our day to day lives, I think it’s very common to feel invisible. And that’s something we really see in this show…women who are essentially invisible. Women who had just been broken up with by the boyfriends and now aren’t sure what to do with their lives. Women who feel stuck in jobs that they hate…or maybe just wish they had more. But when they’re seen, these women blossom. Those are the beautiful stories we see in Songs for Nobodies.

Something else that I loved was how these women showed their dreams. There is a line in the show- “And that the best advice is not: Follow Your Dream. It’s Adjust Your Dream.” This line really struck me. We are always encouraged to follow our dreams, but at a certain point, we realize that that is just not realistic. For most of us, anyway. But we can still fly, and I think that’s really the important part. Even if our lives don’t turn into what we always thought they would, it doesn’t mean it’s anything to be pessimistic about. Adjusting your dreams can be okay. As long as you don’t let go of them.

I feel like I learned a lot from watching Songs for Nobodies. And I’m not just talking historical facts about these unforgettable women. I feel like I walked away thinking about dreams, and the interactions we have in our every day lives. I’ve had a few encounters with people I admire and follow (I had a very nice conversation with Jonathan Groff once, and got a big hug out of it), and they’re not encounters I’ll ever forget. Even when it’s years behind me, it’s something I’ll always hold on to. Someone I love gave me the time of day. That’s what we see in this show.

Even if we are in the shadows, or invisible, and may be there forever, it doesn’t mean we can’t make something of our lives. Because we can make so much of our lives. We’re the most important players in the game…all the others would be nothing without us. So when you are feeling like a nobody, remember that there’s a song out there for you.

#history #opinion #people039slight #zoé