The lights are finally back up on Broadway. And while theater buffs can’t wait to flock to the stages to see their favorite Broadway shows, no one is more excited than the singers and actors themselves, especially those preparing to take the stage for what feels like the first time.
Matt Manuel is one of those people. Last year, the actor, who landed his big break playing soul singer Marvin Gaye in the national tour of Motown, had just begun his debut Broadway run as The Temptations’ lead singer David Ruffin in Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of The Temptations.
On March 11, 2020, Manuel performed what he didn’t know would be his last show of the year. Just days later, Covid-19 forced New York City into a bleak shutdown that would shutter Broadway for an unfathomable 18 months.
“I think it was disbelief. Initially, I thought, ‘Okay, we’ll be back next week,’” Manuel recounts of that time. “And then a week passed, I said, ‘Okay, we’ll be back next month.’ And then I started realizing really what was happening.”
“There are no real words to describe the feeling because for anyone who is an artist, not being able to make art for a year-and-a-half, not being able to work is hard. And there was a trade-off to it because you also had all of this time to spend with friends and family… but there was no performing,” he explains.
It was a difficult time for the Detroit native who was grappling with not being able to perform and having no steady income while living in one of the most expensive cities in the world.
“I had just signed a lease. I had just moved… I was in New York a month-and-a-half. And then everything closed down. I had just signed a lease that day,” he recalls. “It became very real and very scary. And I’m like, ‘Oh God, I just signed a lease in New York and I don’t even have any money. What am I going to do?’”
He continues, “It was hard. I did go home for some time, and I decided, Okay, I live in New York City, I’m going to do this and I’m going to do this on my own.’ I felt like it was important to experience that.”
Though the thought of returning to New York amid a tumultuous time was “scary,” Manuel found some peace in the unknown and focused on embracing his new life.
“I didn’t have any time to settle. I’d been so ‘go, go, go.’ So I said, ‘I’m going to sit back and decorate my apartment and figure out, you know, this water bill situation, and be an adult.’ And I didn’t know how badly I needed that and needed to focus on that,” he says. “I made it. And I have to remind myself of that. I am making it.”
And make it he did. Nearly 18 months after Broadway’s initial shutdown, musicals and plays are reopening throughout the fall season. Now, Manuel and his Ain’t Too Proud cast, are counting down the days until their opening night performance on Oct. 16.
“There was never a doubt in my mind that we weren’t coming back,” he says but also admits, “at the same time, there’s also a level of trying not to get excited about it because anything could happen in this time.”
Luckily, reuniting with his castmates, getting back to rehearsals and a Tony Awards performance with John Legend helped Manuel get back into the groove of things.
“It was such an awesome experience. And for me, I’m the baby of the Temps and everything is new to me,” he says of performing during the 2021 Tony Awards with his castmates and Legend, adding that working with “the Temps,” as he calls them, is like “a big old family.”
But while Manuel says that he was “so ready” to get back to rehearsals, some things came back easier than others.
“My lines came back really naturally, the choreography came back pretty naturally but the blocking did not,” he says. “I was not aware of anything. I was like, ‘Spatially, I don’t know where I’m supposed to be, but I know I’m supposed to do this move.’”
Joking, he continues, “I had a recurring nightmare about one number in the show, and it’s close to the beginning of the show. We were working the number before it and I was confident in that, and then the piano player kept playing, and our choreographers were like, ‘No, let’s just see what happens.’ And I was like, ‘Oh no, this is my nightmare happening in real life.’ But it actually went a lot better than expected.”
“The real thing is there are no mistakes, there are no wrongdoings here. It’s a safe space to be wrong, to not remember. And the expectation is that we’re going to get there together,” he explains.
Part of that shared experience is taking in his peers’ performances. When the Ain’t Too Proud actor isn’t on stage, he’s seeing as many Broadway shows as possible.
“So I just recently last week saw Chicken and Biscuits and I loved it. I’m trying to be a real New Yorker and go see as many shows as I can,” he says.
In the meantime, Manuel, who initially wanted to be a gymnast when he was growing up, is keeping his hopes high for future roles.
“As far as starring in something, there’s still a place in my heart for Hamilton. I would love to be Aaron Burr,” he says.
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