This content was originally published by the Longmont Observer and is licensed under a Creative Commons license.
In the Trenches: A Parenting Musical (in process) is a musical written by Longmont's own Graham and Kristina Fuller. It explores the unique joys, hilarity, and craziness involved with parenting young children.
Graham and Kristina have lived in Longmont since 2009. Prior to writing their own musical, the couple starred in and produced a show called The Last Five Years, which is a two-person musical about marriage. After it closed, they began to ponder what they wanted to do next. "We immediately wanted to something we would connect with," stated Kristina.
Being parents to a two and five-year-old, their next thoughts were "We should do something about parenting. This is what we are super in right now." After some searching, they were unable to find a show that fit.
That is when a thought hit Graham, "we should just write it. Let’s write a show about parenting." And he got to work and one day announced to Kristina, "Hey, babe, I dropped some lyrics into the Google Drive and just take a look, see what you think." Her thoughts were “You’re crazy, that’s hilarious."
However, Kristina indulged him and took a look at the lyrics and thought, "Oh, I know how this is supposed to sound." And that is the story of how the song Snow and the musical In the Trenches was born.
For the last 10 months, the couple has been working together along with Dan Graeber, orchestrator for the musical, to develop the songs and the sounds that accompany them. Kristina states, once they "have a song, we’ll write maybe one more verse or something like that. Then he’ll [Graeber] give us his feedback and take a recording of the song, and then turn it into a piano-vocal arrangement."
After going through this process several times, it became time to put out a call for auditions. Marcos Ospina responded with a video audition. He attended high school in Boulder and went to NYU for college, the same school Kristina attended. Ospina was connected through his voice lesson coach, who happens to be a former classmate of Kristina's. The couple was so impressed with his talent they didn't hesitate to agree that Ospina would be an asset to the show.
The fourth member of the cast is Vidushi Goyal. She recently graduated from CU Boulder where she had been a part of an a capella group called, Mile 21 a cappella. This group was founded by Graham and a friend when they attended college there around 15 years ago. Goyal's performances stood out to Graham and the Fullers invited her to listen to their work.
When finished, the Fullers expect the musical to be around a 90-minute show without an intermission. Their vision for the end product will be "sung through with some dialogue, if there is dialogue it will either be right before, leading into a song or within a song, giving context. There’s not going to be a plot, per se, but it will have a dramatic arc from the time the baby is born through grappling with what this whole parenting thing is all about," says Graham.
The musical is not only the story of this couple's journey through parenthood. It is also inspired by the experiences their friends share. The song Yoga Pants is inspired by a group of moms who claim yoga pants as their official uniform.
"We definitely take what our own impression of what this whole process is and then we boil it down to things that, are not necessarily universal, but common between parents of this age range. We want to be as inclusive as possible about the parenting journey," says Graham.
The couple each shared a story about songs that are very personal to them because they were inspired by their own family.
Kristina: I have the most personal song, I feel like. So, we have a five-year-old and we had had a particularly very rough day, him and I, which ended in lots of tears on both sides, and Graham came home and I told him about our day, and he heard me and I knew he heard me, and then he came back the next day and he said “Oh, I wrote a song. There’s this song and it’s called ‘So much of you in me’, and it’s about how sometimes it’s... we’re the hardest on the people we love, on our children, because we see so much of ourselves in them and we want to make life easier for them and not have them go through the same experiences we had to go through. So, that’s probably the most personal and the hardest to sing because it is so personal.
Graham: I think so far in the show, the dad song, I mean, no surprises, is the most personal for me, because it just is really about, the dad as the parent, and his experiences and the idea that these experiences with the kids at this small, little age are gonna go by so quickly, and grappling with how fast it’s moving but also knowing it’s going to be great going forward too. That song is definitely the most personal for me.
According to Kristina, ultimately, the dream is for In the Trenches: A Parenting Musical to become a Broadway hit and to be seen all over the world. In the meantime, the couple is focused on having a rough draft version of the final show, ready to take to an initial workshop by the end of the year. Once that step is complete, they plan to submit it to theatre festivals.
In the Trenches: A Parenting Musical recently held a preview at Still Sellers and Family Village. While their next performance is not scheduled as of yet, Graham hopes to set something up before the end of 2018 or early 2019.
