If you haven’t seen “The Notebook” at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre (W. 45th Street), you are missing out on a life-changing experience. I recently had the pleasure and privilege of speaking to actor Dorian Harewood, who plays Older Noah in this production. Harewood brings a tenderness, heart, and soul to this role that you will feel in the core of your being. He stars in “The Notebook” with Maryann Plunkett as Older Allie, along with Middle Noah and Younger Noah actors Ryan Vasquez and John Cardona, and Middle Allie and Younger Allie actresses Joy Woods and Jordan Tyson.
While talking with this extraordinary thespian, I said that I loved his work, from “Roots: The Next Generation” and “The Jesse Owens Story” to so much more. He’s done it all: television, film, theater. I told him, “I’m from that generation and I think you’re such an amazing actor, and when I saw you on that stage, you’re phenomenal in the way that you embody that character. I have been a theater critic for 39 years and I have never had a show affect me the way that that show did.”
The humble Harewood replied, “That’s so wonderful to hear and I’m very honored that you felt that way about it. I’m honored at the way audiences have felt, very much like you’re talking about, and I’m very grateful to hear that because it’s a terrific project, and as an actor, I just do what I can do to make whatever project I’m working on work. This is a wonderful project—the way it was written and the character and the whole thing—and the way it’s turned out is wonderful, so I’m glad that people are getting it. People like you and the rest of the public are really understanding what this project is about.”
Harewood went into great detail about his career and this amazing musical. The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.
AmNews: What attracted you to the role of Older Noah?
Dorian Harewood (DH): It’s interesting because it’s pretty straightforward. My manager had told me they were doing an audition for Older Noah for the musical “The Notebook” and I had not read the novel or seen the movie [but] I said I would audition for it. I auditioned before I looked at the movie. It was an audition my manager pushed me to do, saying, “You have to get more into the activity of performing; people need to know you’re still around.” I said “yeah” and I ended up looking at the movie and I liked it.
The character I was auditioning for was played by James Gardner in the movie and I had done two movies with James Gardner, so I said I’m auditioning for the role that he had done…Once I got the callback and I got the role, I found out that the project had been done in Chicago and my character had been played by a terrific actor, John Beasley, [and] I really liked his work. I found out that he had tragically died [while] on the project, so they had to get a replacement for that character when they were going to bring it to Broadway. For me, once I saw the movie, read the script—and as a singer, music is my first love, I knew this project was for me.
AmNews: How long has it been since you stepped onto a Broadway stage?
DH: The last Broadway appearance that I had was 46 years ago. I’ve done some stage [work] since then. Forty-six years ago, I was in a play called “The Mighty Gents,” by Richard Wesley. And it had at that time an unknown actor, Morgan Freeman, in the cast. It was a terrific project. It didn’t last very long, but that led to me getting the role in “Roots: The Next Generation,” a role I would not have gotten if “The Mighty Gents” had been successful, because when it closed, that’s when the people in Hollywood hired me for the role of Simon Haley…, which turned out to be the largest part in the whole 26 hours of “Roots 1 and 2.” So that was fate, but that’s the last time I was on a Broadway stage.
When I came to New York over 52 years ago, my first Broadway job in late 1972 [was in] a musical called “Two Gentlemen of Verona” and it had won the Tony that year. I auditioned for standby for the lead and swing singer and dancer. It was monumental for me, because in that musical, I met my future wife and we’re still together. We’ve been married 45 years, but we knew each other for five years before that, so we have a total of 50 years. After that show, we did another musical together called “Brainchild” and that’s when we started dating. My wife is Nancy Harewood, but at the time, she was going by Nancy Denning. [After] not being on Broadway for 46 years, this was a great return and a terrific project.
AmNews: This musical is a first for “The Notebook.” What was the challenge of being in a musical like this, especially with such nontraditional casting used for this role? What is the message behind having the two main characters represented by actors of different ethnic groups?
DH: The challenge, fortunately, was answered through the writing and terrific co-directors Schele Williams and Michael Greif. The writing was so well done. As an actor, I do what is dictated to me, but fortunately, it wasn’t difficult to get into the character and do what I [could] with the role, but the challenge you’re talking about embodies one of the first times that the casting has been such as it is for this project.
The audience first sees people that look differently, that have different melanin and skin color, and that’s kind of interesting. But before they can even think about it, they’re already into the characters themselves. Why? Because they’re human beings. It’s a story about human beings and they don’t think about the racial things. Malcolm X talked about recognizing people as being human beings, not white or Black. Jane Elliott, a woman from Iowa, an ex-educator, went through a journey to make sure that people see people as human beings after Martin Luther King was assassinated.
This particular project does that as well. It doesn’t beat you over the head with it. It just shows you people who are not traditionally cast and before you know it, you are seeing the human side of those people as opposed to what I call the meatside. The different colors, sizes, shapes—it doesn’t matter, it’s the inside of human beings.
The message of this is that love doesn’t have any boundaries as far as what the exterior is. The universality of love is beyond the exterior and that is the universality of humans—we are the human race, we are one family. That’s what makes it so effective, because it affects people at their core. A wide range of audiences come to see it, but the throughline is it’s a love story. It’s about the innermost feeling that connects us all.
AmNews: At times, all the Noahs are on the stage together, and race and ethnic backgrounds seem to disappear. All the audience experiences is the bond between the characters. How were you and your fellow actors—Ryan Vasquez and John Cardoza—able to create this beautiful bond?
DH: First of all, they’re terrifically talented artists and the way that we help to make this work is by accepting the basic truths about human beings and love and relationships and those challenges. The challenges of dealing with a person you love so deeply who has the challenges of dementia or Alzheimer’s—all of those challenges that come with the story. It allows us to play the words that are written so beautifully by Bekah Brunstetter and sing the gorgeous words of Ingrid Michaelson.
That’s the way I approached it with them. We just did it and it all fell into place. That’s a tribute to the way it was written from the book, to the movie, to the next level, which is the musical itself. It’s very challenging energy-wise, concentration-wise. It’s exhausting and at the same time, invigorating and life-affirming.
On my side, I just became the character and the words and music dictated everything to me as to how I would react because of the way it’s written and the people with whom I’m working—John, Ryan, Joy, Jordan, and MaryAnn. Especially that interaction between MaryAnn and [me] that works so beautifully…
AmNews: When you are performing as Noah, you are so genuine in your reactions to Allie. How were you able to find your way to perform Noah so beautifully?
DH: The reason I’m able to do it is when I became an actor, I started as a singer and I got talked into acting by the late, great Bette Davis. For me, not having had acting classes and not being technically trained as an actor, once I got into it, I just felt that all the things that I do as an actor had to do with learning the lines, getting all the information that we’re supposed to have for a role, and then just emptying myself—the Dorian Harewood out of myself—filling it with the character that I’m playing. That’s the way I go about it and I don’t know the technical term for that stuff. But I know with this project, as with all my acting projects, everything is dictated to me by first the script, the words, the backstory, all the information that I get.
In “Roots,” Alex Haley gave us mounds of information on his family. I knew everything that I needed to know about Simon Haley and I was able to do the script by becoming that character. It was no different in this project.
Michael Greif told me that he had seen me in a project called “Streamers” and I was nothing like the character. This character hated his life and the world. I told him I didn’t want to do the role, but my wife Nancy convinced me to do it.
This was a character that was angry and hated his existence. She told me that people would be compassionate because [I] would make people see why he was the way he was. This character of Noah is reading and experiencing the frustration of trying to get the love of his life to realize she has a family, we have a son [and] daughter, and I am her husband, so it’s a process. It’s challenging every night, but that’s how I go about having Noah do what he’s doing.
AmNews: Why should people go to see “The Notebook”?
DH: Quite simply, people should go to see it because it is a true love story. It covers all the challenges of love and life. It is literally a universal love story and it will affect everyone, and they will be cheating themselves not to see it.
For our full interview with Dorian Harewood, visit www.amsterdamnews.com.
AmNews: Have you personally had friends and family who have suffered the way that Allie is suffering?
DH: Yes: My best friend, who is no longer with us. His mother died of Alzheimer’s. I called his mother Mother #2. We grew up [together] from grade school. He was my cardiologist. His mother eventually started showing signs of Alzheimer’s and I didn’t know anything about that. I experienced the frustration that he and his family went through. That’s a rough situation and that feeds what I would have in portraying this role.
AmNews: Audiences cried in the first act and I joined them with tears in the second act. What does it do to your spirit to hear people reacting so strongly and knowing that the audience is touched by this story so deeply?
DH: Getting into the medium of live theater, that is my favorite medium over television and film. I do all of it and I’ve been fortunate enough to do those mediums. That is the unique part of live theater—it is a collaboration of audience and performers, so we’re up on stage and we’re performing and we’re hearing these things.
As a matter of fact, one night, we hear the regular people sniffling and crying and it pushes us as well to continue with the reality of the play, but at one point, a woman was crying so hard and we’re at the moment where Allie realizes I’m Noah and we hug and she’s crying and she just let out ,“I’m sorry, I can’t help myself” and the whole audience almost applauded. There was the nervous laughter and reactions, and we kept going. But the fact was and is that that is part of the collaboration between the audience and the performers in doing live theater. It’s wonderful. It only makes us even more committed to the reality of the show.
MaryAnn always says this is not a traditional musical where everything is nice and smooth and sweet. This is rough, this is real; it’s love, it’s the beauty of love, the challenges of love, the persistence of trying to get through horrible situations like dementia and Alzheimer’s, and it doesn’t apologize for it. It is as real as it can be and the audiences’ reactions to it only add to the reality of the situation.
Letting out one’s emotions is a catharsis. This project has tears, laughter, and a whole range of emotions.
AmNews: You mentioned that Bette Davis got you into acting. What do you mean?
DH: Bette Davis literally is the person who got me to do acting. There was a book called “The Corn is Green” and they did a movie called “Miss Moffat” and decided to do a musical called “Miss Moffat” that would star Bette Davis. There was an audition to find a character of a Black teacher, Morgan Evans, and that’s who I auditioned for.
I went in, auditioned for the musical, sang, and got the part. Bette told me afterward, “I really loved your singing, but your acting when we did the reading—I really liked that, too. Have you ever thought about dramatic acting?” I said, “No, I came to New York as a singer. Singing has been my first and only love.”
She said, “Well, we’re doing this musical here now, but you should consider dramatic acting, Dorian, because your dramatic instincts are very much similar to mine and you’d be cheating yourself if you don’t at least explore that.”
So I told her, “Well, okay, coming from you, I will take your advice. Once we’ve done this musical and it’s a big hit, then I’ll audition for some dramatic stuff.”
Unfortunately for the show, she hurt her back. We were sold out on a national tour and we were going to tour the country before coming to Broadway. The show closed out of town.
I took her advice and auditioned for my very first acting role, which was a Broadway play called “Don’t Call Back.” This was in 1974 and I auditioned for that and got the part, and I won a Theater World Award for best incoming actor.
That play opened and closed the same night. Bette Davis came and picked up the award for me because I was doing a project in L.A. The Theater World Awards were so excited she was coming to get the award for me. She became my mentor during my early acting career. I would call her from Hollywood and she would give me advice.
I’ve been totally blessed. It’s been a storybook career for me.