Saratoga News

Photograph by Robert Scheer

'Schoolhouse Rock Live!' producers are Saratogans (from left) Scott, Shannon and Stephen Guggenheim.

Animation Translation

The Guggenheims pump life into cartoon characters

By Natasha Evans-Beauchamp

Conjunction junction, what's your function? Hookin' up lessons and fun with music; gettin' a generation of kids singin' about grammar and science.

When Saratogans Scott, Shannon and Stephen Guggenheim watched Schoolhouse Rock in between episodes of Bugs Bunny and Road Runner as youngsters in the '70s, they had no idea that someday they'd be producing a live version of the popular cartoon.

"We all loved watching the show and singing along with Interplanet Janet," Shannon Guggenheim says. Now, more than 20 years after the show premiered on TV, the Guggenheims are bringing "I'm Just a Bill," "My Hero Zero" and "Conjunction Junction" to the Alcazar Theater in San Francisco. Schoolhouse RockLive! San Francisco is presented by Guggenheim Productions in association with TheatreBAM Chicago.

"We wanted to bring a show to town the whole family could enjoy together. There are shows geared for little children, and there are shows geared for adults. We think every age group will find something to like in Schoolhouse Rock Live!," Scott Guggenheim says. He and his brother, Stephen, grew up in Saratoga, where their passion for things theatrical took root.

"Our parents brought us to every musical that came to San Francisco when we were growing up. We would all go out to dinner and then see the show. It was always a big event for us," Stephen recalls. "We want families to leave Schoolhouse Rock Live! with a similar experience."

Not only did Scott and Stephen's parents take them to the theater to participate as part of the audience, they also encouraged their sons to become involved in local theater.

Their mother, Karen Guggenheim, says, "We thought this was a healthy thing for our boys to do. Being a part of a boy choir taught Scott and Stephen how to read music and perform on stage, but more importantly, the boy choir helped them develop their self-esteem."

Her fear was that the two would end up competing against one another. "I prayed that wouldn't happen; fortunately, one likes to be behind the stage and one in front," she says.

"We produced our first play together," Scott Guggenheim remembers. "It was a play about Noah's ark at our synagogue, Beth-David in Saratoga. There were 100 children between the ages of 5 and 12 representing the animals in the story. My brother and I had such a great time with that project; I can trace my interest in directing back to that play."

It was an interest in theater that brought Shannon, the third member of the theatrical trio, into the family. Scott met his future bride at California Theatre Wing, where they both worked for six years before getting married.

"I met Scott when I auditioned for the part of the Ugly Duckling; and just like the character in that story, I gained a lot of self-esteem and confidence," she recalls. "Scott and I are enormously lucky to both love what we do and get to work together; so often you hear about couples having to split up geographically in order to pursue their careers."

After Noah's Ark and Free to Be You and Me at the Jewish Community Center, Scott and Stephen became more and more involved in the theater, eventually choosing careers in the performing arts.

Scott went on to become the director of the California Theatre Wing and Young Conservatory Theatre, producing shows like Alice in Concert, The Little Prince and From the Met to Broadway. At West Valley College, he created the Young People's Theatre Company.

Meanwhile, Stephen's strong, sonorous voice led him to a career in opera. Although he would have liked performing in musical theater, his voice was better suited to La Bohème than, say, Rent. He has sung leading roles in performances around the world, from Royal Albert Hall to l'Opera de Lyon to the San Francisco Opera.

"In singing, your voice makes certain choices about style for you," Stephen explains. Because the Guggenheim brothers usually work in two different media, Schoolhouse Rock Live! affords them one of the rare opportunities they've had to work together since their directing days at Congregation Beth David and the Jewish Community Center.

The original television version of Schoolhouse Rock ran from 1973 to 1985. The theatrical version was created by Chicago's TheatreBAM in 1993 and has just completed its fifth successful year in the windy city.

The San Francisco show is produced and directed by Scott and choreographed by Shannon, with musical direction by Stephen.

In explaining one of the motivations for their involvement with the show, Stephen says, "There was not a lot of money for arts education when we were in school. For our generation, Schoolhouse Rock met some of our needs for musical entertainment. It was written specifically for our age group at the time."

The idea for Schoolhouse Rock came from an advertising executive, Davis McCall, who noticed his son learned the lyrics to songs by the Rolling Stones more easily than the facts of the multiplication table. McCall thought snappy tunes and campy lyrics would help liven up dry subjects and make them stick to children's memory, the same way advertising jingles do.

Bob Dorough, a jazz pianist and composer, was hired to turn grammar school fundamentals into memorable music. And Michael Eisner of ABC Television ran the segments during children's programming to fulfill the network's public service requirements.

The Guggenheims have vast experience in every aspect of creating musical theater, from choreographing dance numbers to supervising set design to creating costumes and scores.

Having worked in the nonprofit sector for most of their careers, the Guggenheims had little practice in finding investors. However, their strong ties to the Saratoga community helped them find people willing to speculate on their talent. Most of the investors are from the Los Gatos and Saratoga communities. "None of our investors has ever put money into live musical theater before. I think people are investing in our future because they have seen our work in the past," Scott Guggenheim says.

While animators use live models to help them create realistic movement for their characters on paper, the Guggenheims had to translate what is plausible in pen and ink to what is possible on stage in the flesh.

"When you watch the show on television, you don't think about these being cartoon characters, drawn in two dimensions, not three, like the performers on stage," Shannon Guggenheim explains. "Cartoon characters can move around the screen much faster than people on stage. And characters like Interplanet Janet move their bodies in ways I don't usually think of choreographing, so I had to change the way I think about dance to accommodate the differences in movement and timing."

With a cast of six performers and more than 30 characters to depict, costumes presented unique challenges as well. "I'm Just a Bill," for example, is supposed to look like a rolled-up parchment with a seal on it saying it's a law.

"The Preamble," "I'm Just a Bill" and "My Hero Zero" come to life on stage as Tom, a grade-school teacher, relaxes in front of the television while he is preparing for the first day of school. The familiar Schoolhouse Rock characters magically spring out of his 15-foot-by-40-foot stage-size television set.

"We think people will leave the stage production singing the songs they remember from the screen and the theater," Stephen Guggenheim says. There will be supertitles over the stage, as they have at the opera, during one of the numbers, so the audience can sing along in the theater.

"We also want to remind people that learning and teaching can be a lot of fun if you put your creativity to the task," Stephen adds.

"Schoolhouse Rock Live!" plays Oct. 18 through Nov. 30 at the Alcaza Theater, 650 Geary St., three blocks west of Union Square in San Francisco. Performances are Wednesdays and Thursdays at 8 p.m., Fridays at 7:30 and 10 p.m.; Saturdays at 5 and 8 p.m.; and Sundays at 2 and 5 p.m. Tickets available from City Box Office, 415/441-4042, or BASS outlets.

[ Back to Contents Page | Saratoga News Home Page | Archives ]