He’s one of many greatest title in present enterprise — and it’s doable you’ve by no means heard of him. At 54, Swedish songwriter and report producer Max Martin has written extra No. 1 singles than any artist, except for Paul McCartney. He counts Taylor Swift, Britney Spears, Katy Perry, Ariana Grande and the Weeknd amongst his collaborators, however he’s so low-key and humble that he refers to his music profession as his “day job.”
That will make musical theater Martin’s ardour undertaking. Particularly the creation of a jukebox musical known as “& Juliet,” which strings collectively a few of his greatest hits in service of an uproarious, feel-good plot that reimagines the heroine of Shakespeare’s well-known teenage tragedy as her personal girl — one who doesn’t resolve to stab herself within the coronary heart when her principal squeeze drinks poison.
Success was essential to the present, primarily as a result of Martin needed to do proper by his A-list collaborators, all of whom gladly agreed to permit their songs to be included within the rating. That includes a libretto by playwright and TV author David West Learn, choreography by Jennifer Weber and almost 30 hits by Martin, the stakes felt very excessive entering into.
Max Martin made his total music catalog obtainable for “& Juliet.”
(Jenny Anderson)
“I have written a lot of these songs with other people, so I felt a huge responsibility towards the artists and the co-writers, that this needed to be something really extraordinary,” Martin mentioned.
Martin had just lately flown in from Japan, simply in time to catch “& Juliet’s” L.A. premiere on Friday on the Ahmanson Theatre. It felt like a homecoming for the present as a result of a lot of its most memorable songs have been recorded in L.A.
Due to earworms together with Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl,” Backstreet Boys’ “I Want It That Way” and Justin Timberlake’s “Can’t Stop the Feeling!,” “& Juliet” has a confirmed observe report. It has survived and thrived for nearly seven years, scoring 9 Olivier nominations — and three wins — throughout its preliminary run on London’s West Finish; and incomes 9 Tony Award nominations throughout its 2022 Broadway debut. It recouped its price final yr and is the one present from the 2022-23 Broadway season that’s nonetheless taking part in.
Within the dangerous world of musical improvement, the place almost 80% of Broadway producers fail to get again their investments, that is thought of a significant win.
Martin was unassuming as he and Learn broke down how the undertaking got here to life in a dialog that highlighted Martin’s deep dedication to the musical and his need to share the limelight with each single actor, producer, creator and crew member who helped carry it to life alongside the best way.
Martin’s spouse, Jenny, got here up with the idea of a musical that includes Martin’s catalog.
“And I was like, ‘Sure, how hard can it be?’” he mentioned with a wry smile. “We were very naive going in.”
A number of years handed throughout which era they took some conferences and spitballed concepts. Nothing caught till 2013 after they had a four-hour dinner with producers Theresa Steele Web page and Tim Headington. Web page was an government at a music administration firm and Headington had produced movies that included “Argo” and “World War Z.”
“This busy man spent hours of his time hanging out with us in the rehearsal room, giving us his original ideas for some of these songs and telling us some of the meanings behind them,” Rachel Simone Webb mentioned of Max Martin.
(Matthew Murphy)
The pair had determined to strive their hand at a jukebox musical, Headington defined in an interview, and after they put collectively a listing of songs they needed to incorporate, they realized virtually your complete listing had been written or co-written by Martin. Web page arrange a gathering with Martin’s supervisor, Martin Dodd, who initially informed them there was no method Martin’s music might be licensed for a musical — that modified after their dinner on the Peninsula resort in Hollywood.
“Max was so generous. He said, ‘Hey, you can have my catalog. You can change words if you want. You can change context, but let’s make this great,” mentioned Headington. “So now we have the best pop musical catalog in the world and we’ve got no story.”
Web page set to work on the lookout for a author, a course of that concerned many dead-ends and much too many pitches about, “a local coming out of Louisiana and now she’s a star,” Web page mentioned. “Or it was a complete retelling of ‘NSync or Backstreet Boys, and we said we do not want anything that’s close to what we worked on, because we’re still friends with all those guys and we want to have that separation.”
Enter Learn. The younger author was about to get a gig on the hit comedy “Schitt’s Creek,” for which he went on to win an Emmy. He was recovering from a concussion and had been suggested by docs to remain in a darkish room so he might heal, Web page recalled. Throughout that point he listened to Martin’s catalog on repeat and in the end offered the fully left-field idea for “& Juliet.”
Web page known as Headington instantly and mentioned, “We found it.”
Then they flew Learn to L.A. to pitch Martin in his studio, and Martin agreed. From the start it was essential to Martin that the story stood by itself — with out the music.
“We didn’t want to shoehorn the songs into the story,” he mentioned, nodding in appreciation at Learn. “I don’t understand how you did it, David. How you made it feel as if these songs originated from the story.”
Learn mentioned the most effective half for him was being given free reign to make use of no matter music he noticed match from Martin’s catalog with none calls for about how he did it.
“There are some of Max’s most famous songs,” he mentioned, noting that there was no method he wasn’t going to make use of Spears’ chart-topper “… Baby One More Time.” “But then there are also these lesser-known, but still incredible songs, and part of what works is that balance.”
Rachel Simone Webb and Mateus Leite Cardoso within the North American Tour of “& Juliet.”
(Matthew Murphy)
Martin invested himself and his time wholly within the endeavor from the soar, together with collaborating on the orchestrations.
“This busy man spent hours of his time hanging out with us in the rehearsal room, giving us his original ideas for some of these songs and telling us some of the meanings behind them,” mentioned Rachel Simone Webb, who performs Juliet within the North American tour and served as an understudy for a similar position within the 2022 Toronto manufacturing. “And every time he started speaking, it was dead silent in the room, so that we could listen and just understand his mind and glean ideas from this icon in the rehearsal room.”
Webb mentioned she has heard individuals name Martin the “Shakespeare” of pop music.
Webb additionally sang the a part of one in all Romeo’s exes for the official solid recording and recalled that Martin was there giving notes and collaborating with the solid.
Martin even recorded one album with the British solid and one other with the American solid, Learn mentioned.
“Max treated this like his new album,” he mentioned. “And for the cast to be in the studio with him and have the experience that so many of these world-famous artists have had, that was incredible and that was a surprise to all of us.”
Will Martin write one other musical from scratch now that he’s established himself within the theater world? He smiles demurely. Not simply but. He’s nonetheless bought his day job.
