The Great Gatsby Is Coming to Overture Theater July 29 - August 2: Striving to Be the Best (Part 2 of 2)
Above: A scene from The Great Gatsby; Below: Leanne Robinson
by Jonathan Gramling
Leanne Robinson, who stars as Jordan Baker in the musical adaptation of The Great Gatsby coming to Overture, took the safe route — some would say the hard and long route — to her career in musical theater. Robinson, who hails from London, England, chuckled when she said that her first introduction to theater was as a child. Her parents took her and she cried all through the production.
It has taken Robinson over a decade while experiencing the highs and lows of musical theater and a move from London to New York before she got her first big break touring with The Great Gatsby. When she got the part, she continued to do research on The Great Gatsby. And the role of Jordan Baker is a pretty juicy part.
“I read the book for the first time eventually,” Robinson said. “I had seen the movie. The musical gives Jordan the most kind of juice in a way. She is the one who introduces Nick to the party. You can see this relationship between her and Daisy, which isn’t necessarily fleshed out. You get to see a version of what her and Nick’s relationship could be in a more intimate way. And so articulating these little things in a most kind of flash if you like, which is exciting for me because I get to create the limits of her character that you don’t see in the movie and don’t see in the book. So I get to make those real for her and that is really fun and exciting.”
In order to fulfill herself, Jordan Bales has to be able to adapt to the changing environment around her.
“Jordan is a chameleon,” Robinson said. “She can exist in all of these spaces and blend in somewhat where others may have doubt. And I think that is such a unique characteristic that she has among everyone else. Everyone else in this story exist in their own world and their own space. And they cast about whatever reason that might be. And when they do, they stick out. Jordan is very comfortable in the gaps and space with people who are gamblers and she is also very comfortable engaging with the world that she grew up in. It makes for a very exciting and very layered character.”
And in some ways, Jordan Baker is a woman ahead of her times.
“It’s a very relatable situation,” Robinson said. “They meet and my best friend tries to set me up with this guy. I’m not really interested because I am very much of the belief that I am an independent woman. I’m not going to get married just for the sake of getting married. I make my own money because I play golf and play sports. I don’t need it. But a lot of women of this era needed men for their survival. And I was like, ‘I don’t want that. I don’t want that and I don’t need that.’ For Nick and I, we meet in the beginning. She develops an affection for Nick because she sees a difference in him throughout the play. He’s not like everyone else. He listens to her opinion. And they can have conversations. And he is interested in what she thinks. That is what switches for her.”
And all of these swirling relationships and parties have the Roaring 20s as a backdrop
“The Great Gatsby is a 1920s story, a love tragedy,” Robinson said. “And there is this mysterious man called Gatsby who spent the last five years building himself up in society to grab the attention and affection that he has with a young lady called Daisy. And that is the heart of this story. And then Daisy is a young woman who is a victim of the society that she grew up in. She married for money rather than love. And she has done all of the right things. And she lives in a this biblical home. But she is unhappy and unfulfilled. We see her trying to grab back her independence through this relationship that she once had . There is her and Nick. Nick is the narrator. And so we see this all happen through Nick’s eyes. And I, Jordan, am Daisy’s best friend. And I become an interest of Nick’s. I will say that much.”
But Jordan knows that is going nowhere.
“The truth is Nick is only doing it for Daisy,” Robinson reflected. “Everything he does is for Daisy. He literally built this house across the bay for her. He is making this money, becoming this man just to grab the attention of the love of his life. Daisy is his sole motivation.”
This is Robinson’s first long-term tour with a Broadway production in the U.S. And so she is getting to see many parts of the U.S. for the first time.
“Life on the road has its challenges,” Robinson said. “I’ve made some great friends on tour. And that has been very helpful. The environment is a healthy one. It comes with its challenges, moving from place to place. Sometimes you can’t always eat the food you want to eat. But it is exciting to see different places in America, which I probably wouldn’t have seen. So I’m having a good time right now. We’re in Cleveland, Ohio. I’m going to eat some great seafood that I’ve heard about. It’s really nice to see places that you may not get to.”
As for her future acting dreams, Robinson still hasn’t given up on Dream Girls, a production she first tried out for, but didn’t land a part.
“I would love to do Dream Girls, the musical,” Robinson said. “That’s at the very top of my list. Maybe some day I will get to come full circle. That is the main one. I would like to do some classical musicals one day, whatever that may be. I don’t have a particular role in mind per se. I like to perform complex characters I can dip into, characters with nuance, characters with journeys that create highs and lows, things that I can relate to as a human being and stretch and stretch myself trying to understand the why of someone else and putting that into a body. That is an interesting experience. I’m finding similarities in characters that I think that I would never do that.”
Robinson hopes that Madison comes out to see The Great Gatsby. She knows that the production will not disappoint.
“Madison people should come out and see The Great Gatsby because it’s a beautiful production,” Robinson said. “On stage, it is truly dazzling. The costumes are phenomenal. The storytelling is exceptional. The music is hot. And then there is the choreography. It is so that. That’s totally why you should come to see The Great Gatsby. It’s just a beautiful telling of an old story.”
Leanne Robinson has learned and experienced a lot in her relatively short time in musical theater. Listen to her advice. Go see The Great Gatsby while you still can.
