One thing that stood out at recent rehearsals for the new musical, Only Gold, was Kate Nash’s low profile.
It’s not just that her hair is no longer the signature fiery red, but has taken on an auburn hue. Nash, who wrote the score and played the narrator, quietly blended in with the rest of the cast as director and choreographer Andy Blankenbühler of “Hamilton” fame tweaked some of the songs. When she wasn’t actively participating in a section, she tended to stand up against the wall, her eyes intently tracking the dancers.
The London-born singer-songwriter has been releasing records and touring the world for a decade and a half. She topped the charts there — and she also appeared in the Netflix wrestling comedy “GLOW.” But even though “Only Gold” was her first theatrical experience, Nash remained calm, perhaps even at peace.
“When I’m here, I’m like, ‘Oh my God, this feels like my music home,'” she says happily as she sits in the empty mezzanine of the MCC Theater. . 7.
The show, as Nash said, “is about having the courage to follow your heart. And we tell that story through 1920s Paris and Cosimo’s royal family.” It refers to the kingdom invented for “.)
A period musical about a king about to marry his daughter might sound a stretch for an artist known for a sharply personal style rooted in the present moment. But Blankenbuehler, her three-time Tony Award winner and longtime Nash fan, knew early on that her sensibility and craftsmanship would be a perfect fit for his envisioned story, and in 2010 they arranged the meeting. I arranged. I found it poetic and funky and weird, but at the same time it was rhythmic and really suited my choreography. “I also liked that there were just as many low and high parts. For example, she wrote really high and quirky and really low and nasty and badass.”
But finding that artistic home took more than three clicks on her heels. It has taken several turns since then.
Born into a middle-class family (her father worked in information technology and her mother was a nurse), Nash attended the Brit School, a London arts institution where Adele and Amy Winehouse have graduated. I barely graduated and worked in a sandwich shop. Her Myspace page caught the attention of record executives. When ‘Foundations’ was released, its edgy, evocative personal storytelling established her as a supportive new voice.In 2008, Britt won the award for Best British Female Solo Her Artist and embarked on an extensive tour around the world. However, in 2012, her record label suddenly dropped her. This hardly slowed the singer down, who released her third album independently the following year.
Then, in 2015, the bad news arrived. Nash, who was living in Los Angeles at the time, realized her manager had cheated on her. She was almost bankrupt.
“I had no money, so I had to sell all my clothes and move out of my apartment,” she said. “I packed my things, sold everything, moved to England, and thought, ‘What am I going to do?’ And I auditioned for GLOW.”
She was eventually cast as the street-smart Rhonda, a struggling model who goes by the name of Britannica to become a wrestler. This opportunity was both a lifeline and a fulfillment for Nash, who had long dreamed of becoming an actress.
In a joint video chat, “GLOW” creators and showrunners Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch highlighted Nash’s team spirit and tenacity. To convince them during the casting process, she filmed herself doing guerrilla style moves. i’m coming! don’t forget about me! said Mensch. “She participated in one of her most perfectly insane tapes.”
“She has some kind of POV,” added Hulahive with admiration. She said, “Even as a musician, she has a real punk rock spirit and she’s been doing her own thing outside the system for a long time. You can get that feeling from her.” ”
In the documentary Kate Nash: Underestimate the Girl (2018), Nash’s tenacity is clearly visible. “She keeps getting up every time she gets knocked down,” said documentary director Amy Goldstein.
Netflix canceled ‘GLOW’ in 2020 after three seasons. But after ten years of intermittent work, Only Gold is finally ready to taxi to the runway.
Originally, Blankenbuehler, who wrote the show’s book with Ted Marawah, wanted to adapt existing songs to fit a period fantasy concept involving three couples with relationship problems. “I was like, ‘I want to make a musical with my music, I want to knock myself out. Have fun,'” Nash said.
It soon became apparent that this approach had creative limitations, so the two agreed that she would write original material. (Like “Mouthwash” from “Made of Bricks,” beloved oldies are on the show.)
“Kate is the kind of person who writes what she wants to write. This is a compliment,” said Blankenbuehler. “She writes it when she feels it, so she’s always in her music. One of the things she’s worked hard on is dressing up as a character and writing songs from within the character.”
Nash found that certain experiences are liberating rather than constraining. “Oh my god, I wrote it for a male character — it was euphoric,” she said. , talks about masculinity and power.I really enjoyed starting to write the character.It was just another string to my bow.”
Now she can do more with other media. Earlier this year, she released the irresistibly catchy “Imperfect,” which she wrote for the Netflix series The Baby-Sitters Club. “I think ‘Only Gold’ allows me to fully immerse myself in that kind of thing,” Nash said. “I was like, ‘OK, a bedroom scene during a fashion show about teenage girls, pop power, and embracing imperfections — wait five minutes!’ It’s not “incomplete” how I would describe it, but now I enjoy writing it and don’t worry about it. ”
In the musical, she discovers quite late in the process that coming up with a new set of songs for the King (played by Broadway veteran Terrence Mann) is just part of what Nash has been waiting for. “Even in our first workshop, we naively thought we were just going to do music on the show,” she said. Why did the contract say ‘actor’? And suddenly I got scared.”
For Blankenbuehler, getting Nash to appear in the musical was a no-brainer. “I felt that the mechanics of the show were the beat, the music,” he said.
Her experience learning to work on “GLOW” made the choreography less difficult to understand. Another of her points of entry was finding unexpected connections with other cast members of hers. Many of her members of the cast were trained dancers.
“Someone at one workshop once said to me, ‘Every dancer knows who you are because of the Nicest Thing. “I wrote this song when I was 18 and desperate for love while playing an acoustic guitar in my living room,” she adds with a laugh.
As Nash settles into her new life on the New York stage, those days now feel far away. “There are times when you really have to clench your chin instead of cry.”