Actor and singer Claybourne Elder is on his way to the Big Gay Cabaret. For the first time, this out and proud performer will be singing tunes publicly for fans in an intimate setting in Chicago.
His stage resume continues to impress with credits from the revival of Sunday in the Park with George and Stephen Sondheim’s musical Company. His most recent production was last year as Gaston in Beauty and the Beast at The Muny in St. Louis.
His voice can be heard on the cast recordings of Bonnie & Clyde, Road Show and Venice in the past and currently, he plays John Adams on HBO’s The Gilded Age.
His initiative City of Strangers supplies Broadway show tickets to those in need and was inspired by a stranger who changed the course of his life. He talked about this and much more in a recent interview before arriving in the Windy City.
Windy City Times: Hi, Claybourne. Where are you calling in from?
Claybourne Elder: I am at the playground with my son near his school.
WCT: He’s adorable on Instagram.
CE: Thank you. He’s a good kid.
WCT: What’s challenging about being a gay dad?
CE: All of it! [laughs] Being a parent is all-consuming. People used to tell me that everything would change once I had a child and it drove me crazy, but it was a big priority shift. It is actually lovely because it made me slow down and enjoy the passage of time.
He’s at an age where he asks all kinds of difficult questions and right now that’s my challenge. I have to figure out how to talk about God, death and everything. That’s a lot right now.
WCT: Are you bringing him with you to Chicago for this gig?
CE: Yes, my husband Eric Rosen and Bo are both coming. Eric wants to see his friends, so I am coming in earlier and staying longer. They will be here in the middle of it, which should be fun.
WCT: Have you spent much time in Chicago before this upcoming trip?
CE: Only with Eric. I have never performed there before, so this is my first time doing a show there, which is exciting.
WCT: How do you plan a show such as this? Do you practice in front of Eric?
CE: I write it myself and I do presentations of it in a rehearsal studio for people. We have been good over the years about giving each other feedback. Some of it is feedback that can only be given as a spouse and some of its feedback that can’t be given as a spouse!
WCT: How do you pick the songs?
CE: When I wrote this show I wrote what I wanted to talk about first. I found songs that went with the stories that I loved for the most part. There were a couple of songs that came first, but most of them led to stories that I wanted to share.
It is half standup and half cabaret. There’s more talking than a usual cabaret show and more singing than a standup show. It’s somewhere in the middle of those two things.
WCT: Are you going to share a Patti LuPone story?
CE: Oh yeah, a couple…
WCT: She was just in Chicago this past Friday at the Lyric Opera.
CE: She recorded the introduction announcement to my show to play before every performance and it’s hilarious.
WCT: I bet she tells the audience to silence their telephones.
CE: She welcomes them to the Clay show and says they can take pictures but turn off their cell phones during the show. She was very sweet to do it.
WCT: Have you been watching Patti on the television show Agatha All Along?
CE: No, I haven’t seen it, but I need to watch it.
WCT: She’s holding her own on it. Is there a title for your cabaret show?
CE: It’s titled I Want to Be Evil, which is a song I sing in the show. It is sort of a joke because I am generally seen as being a very nice, gay, ex-Mormon dad.
I talk about the nature of goodness and my own discovery of it. When I was young I wanted to do the bad things that people were doing, like move to New York and be an actor.
WCT: With Disney and many musicals the fun characters are usually the villains.
CE: Exactly. I love playing a villain. It’s the best!
WCT: Do you have a favorite musical of all time?
CE: Into the Woods. I can’t get enough of it and just love it.
WCT: Talking to Bernadette Peters about her role with Into the Woods was such a treat.
CE: I bet. Her performance made me want to be an actor when I was a kid.
WCT: Have you seen Oh Mary yet?
CE: Yes. I saw it Off-Broadway. I haven’t seen the Broadway production yet. I would love to see how it has grown and shifted. It is so good and Cole Escola is doing an insane thing.
WCT: It’s a hot show to see. Is there a Broadway show you would like to perform in but haven’t yet?
CE: I studied dramaturgy in college and I love working with playwrights. The musical that I want to do the most is being written right now. I like working on a piece with the people who have written it. Creating something and bringing it alive for the first time is my favorite thing to do.
I would really like to play Sweeney Todd and Father in Ragtime. Those are two big ones.
WCT: what are your thoughts on Book of Mormon?
CE: I was asked to do a workshop of Book of Mormon really early on and I said no because it would upset my family. Now everyone loves it and even the Mormon church has embraced it.
What is shocking to me is how accurate they were with the stories and how they captured the feelings of Mormonism within the show.
WCT: You grew up in Utah?
CE: Yes.
WCT: Where does your name come from?
CE: My full name is Claybourne Lorenzo Elder. I was named Lorenzo because of my Latin heat! No, it is not at all. I just went to Italy and was going through passport control where they thought I was Italian. That’s not it either.
I am the seventh Claybourne Elder. It is a family line name and an old Mormon name. My great-great-grandfather had 12 wives and 25 children before he was 25 years old. His name was Claybourne Elder. I am related to a lot of people in Utah because they kept on multiplying.
My son’s name is Claybourne Elder too, so he’s the eighth.
WCT: He goes by Bo?
CE: Yes, those are the two letters in the middle of his name.
WCT: I am getting it now, but your last name Elder is part of Mormon culture also…
CE: That is just a coincidence. My grandfather whom I mentioned before was around Joseph Smith, who founded the church, when they were children and knew each other their whole lives. When I was Edler Elder it was a huge joke.
WCT: Did you ever attend the LGBTQ+-focused concert LoveLoud Festival in Utah?
CE: No, because they weren’t doing it when I lived there.
WCT: Speaking of gay music, you played Gaston in Beauty and the Beast recently.
CE: He’s the gayest. I speak of that in my show. Me and Tommy Bracco, who portrayed Lefou, played it up as much as they would allow.
WCT: Are you bringing an accompanist with you?
CE: Yes, I travel with my music director Rodney Bush, who is also my best friend. He’s a big part of the show and sings backup for me on some songs. I have been touring the show for a year and a half and he’s done almost every single performance with me. I don’t like doing the show without him.
WCT: That makes sense since he supports you and makes you feel comfortable.
CE: He just knows me so well. Knowing how to play with each other onstage is fun.
WCT: Do you go to Cafe Carlyle and cabaret events regularly in New York?
CE: I do, and I like watching cabaret as a genre.
WCT: Is there a particular song that you are excited about playing in Chicago?
CE: I sing Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” but as a slow, country ballad. I turn it into a sad song and it’s one of my favorites to sing.
I sing “Moments in the Woods” from Into the Woods. There are pop songs and a lullaby to my son. There’s a bit of everything in there.
WCT: You are still maintaining your City of Strangers project?
CE: Yes, and we are still giving away tickets to shows. We work with the Wendy Wasserstein Project where students are invited to come in for tickets. We offer tickets to all of the public school teachers in the New York area who teach in the arts. We work with Covenant House to help homeless youth and give away tickets on our Instagram account too.
WCT: What an opportunity for those who can’t afford it to see live theater.
CE: As a young artist it was so important to me to see the thing I wanted to do. If someone can’t see people at the top of their game doing what they want to do, then it’s prohibitive in growing as an artist.
I feel strongly about doing this and we keep pushing along while asking for money.
WCT: About Face Theatre is still doing a pay-what-you-can ticket system similar to this.
CE: Yes and I love that.
WCT: Have you finished filming The Gilded Age?
CE: Season two is all done and season three is already more than halfway done with filming. That will come out next year.
WCT: You have Broadway legend Audra McDonald in the cast.
CE: We never end up on the set together, but we end up in the same places. We will travel to Albany to shoot and all be there together. We all gather on those occasions, which is nice.
WCT: Have you had a favorite moment from The Gilded Age?
CE: A million, but on my last day on set for season one there was a huge group of us filming at the tennis club. It was Kelli O’Hara, Nathan Lane and Donna Murphy, all of these people who I look up to. It was a magical day where we got to hang out in our fancy clothes!
Elder plays Oct. 18-20 at Venus Cabaret Theater, 3742 N. Southport Ave. Visit biggaycabaret.com for tickets today.
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