This fall a new off-Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s 1990 musical Assassins arrives at Classic Stage Company in New York, dramatizing the stories of nine people who attempted to assassinate sitting U.S. presidents (successfully or not) throughout history. A latish—and particularly dark—entry to Sondheim’s oeuvre, Assassins offers an unsettling group portrait of American disillusionment and the lengths to which some will go to be remembered—or merely seen, with John Wilkes Booth’s fatal shooting of Abraham Lincoln in 1865 offering a first, aspirational example for assassins to follow.
Included in that group, alongside figures like Lee Harvey Oswald and John Hinckley Jr., is Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme, a member of the Manson family who, in 1975, pointed a pistol at President Gerald Ford before being tackled by the U.S. Secret Service and sentenced to life in prison. (She was paroled in 2009.) The writer and actor Tavi Gevinson claims that role, returning to the stage for the first time since 2019, when she appeared in Halley Feiffer’s Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow. (Before that were productions of This Is Our Youth, The Crucible, and The Cherry Orchard, among others.)
Ahead of Assassins’s November 14 opening, Vogue spoke to Gevinson about the show’s timely messages, her role in Gossip Girl, and the parts she’d like to take on next.
Vogue: Did you know Assassins well at the outset, or was it something of a discovery for you?
Tavi Gevinson: I grew up on a lot of musical theater and a lot of Sondheim, and I knew the song “Unworthy of Your Love” just as something that my sister would sing—I feel like it was a popular choice among young musical theater kids auditioning for things because it’s sort of pop-y. But in 2019 I did this residency in Northern California and felt homesick, so I was like, This is a time to get into a Sondheim show I don’t know, and I listened to the original cast recording a lot. Then, later that year, I found out that Classic Stage was doing [this production] and felt strongly about auditioning for it and using whatever kind of dormant muscle memory I had of singing from doing voice lessons and musical theater as a kid. And thankfully, it’s also a very weird character. I don’t think I could have a shot at a different kind of musical, but I thought I could do a Manson girl.
It’s been a few years since you were last onstage. How does it feel to be returning to the theater at this particular moment?
I have so many feelings about it. There’re the kind of macro, taking-stock-of-where-the-industry-is-at feelings, and then there’s the very immediate, moment-to-moment strangeness of how it feels to be onstage again. I mean, we just finished our first week of previews and I’m getting more and more comfortable, but I think I’d spent all this time thinking about how euphoric it would feel to do the show finally without thinking about how strange it would be to breathe and spit and be in front of crowds after internalizing all of those things as dangerous. So it’s been, ultimately, this completely thrilling experience, and really a childhood dream come true—but there are also these sharp spikes of fear. I have to remind myself, like, you enjoy this and you like adrenaline and you like being afraid, and all of the things that come with live theater that I didn’t get to feel for so long.
Have Sondheim and Weidman been a big part of the process?
No, which I think is fairly standard for them. When we first started, in March 2020, they said a few words on day one, and since we’ve started, they’ve seen it and shared some thoughts and encouragement. But I feel like our director, John Doyle, is probably more privy to any thoughts that they have.
Beyond learning the book and the score, did you do a lot of research into Lynette Fromme’s life?
I mean, part of why I love doing plays is because I really do believe that nothing I could do on my own could be as interesting as what happens when all of us are together. So in March 2020 I did some research—we got a dramaturgical packet that was very helpful, and I skimmed her memoir a bit—but ultimately the play is such a fever dream. There are so many clever and specific ways in which it’s accurate about these people, but I kind of think, at least with Lynette Fromme, it uses facts of her life as a starting point for a character that is probably not the character you’d create if you were trying to do a biopic. I’ve enjoyed knowing some more about her life, and there are certainly things that it’s helpful to have context for; I mean, her description in the play of meeting Charles Manson has a lot in common with what she wrote in her book, and anything that helps make her feel a little more real and specific to me helps, but I’ve hit so many dead ends in previous productions when I’ve tried to incorporate something that is not in the text.
This is a very political show, and it’s resonated differently every time it’s been staged—in good ways and bad. Is there a moment or lyric that feels especially timely to you now?
There was so much right when we started, and it’s just wild how much more has emerged from it over the last 18 months or so–I remember in the rehearsal room, we would try different stagings for a group number and share our interpretations, and someone would go, “Oh, this reminds me of social media and the way a mob can grow until they’re carrying out violence, or wild misinformation.” And even the opening song and the finale, “Everybody’s Got the Right,” is such a wonderful critique of individualism that is so central to American identity, and definitely white American identity. There are so many moments of very sharp satire, but there would be no point in playing this character if only to make fun, or if you could not seriously think about what causes someone to attempt to assassinate a president, even if the gun wasn’t loaded and it was more of a stunt. The show has a strong point of view, but I don’t think it’s as simple as saying, “Let us teach you how bad all of these people are.” That would be boring.
Zooming out a bit, how are you picking projects these days? Because this feels like such a different endeavor from Gossip Girl, to use an obvious example. What’s appealing to you at this point in your career?
It’s a flattering question, because it creates an impression that I have a wide array of jobs to choose from. [Laughs.] Honestly, I care about if something is fun, if I’ll get paid, if I’ll learn things, if the world of the project is interesting to me, if the character feels like something I think I could do something with. Every day I think it’s completely ridiculous that my job is to hysterically giggle backstage with the people I work with and then wear an elf-like costume and pretend to be a Manson girl on a stage—yet it is also a job.
So I don’t have a very good answer to that question, but this was a no-brainer in terms of wanting to audition for it, because it’s just an incredible show and a really fun, really dark role. And with Gossip Girl, too, at first I was like, I don’t know if I wanna play a mumbly high schooler, I think I’ve done that. And then that wasn’t what they wanted from me at all, which seemed fun.
Are there any other plays or musicals you’re excited about this season?
There’s so much, I feel a little overwhelmed. I really loved Dana H., Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992, and I was totally blown away by the performers in Girl From the North Country. I think that was the first thing I saw, and I wanted to just stay there forever. Now that I’m doing this show I’m not sure what else I’ll have time for, but I’m trying to figure out what my friends really liked and see those things. For example, I really want to see Caroline or Change, and I’m excited for Company.
Yes! It’s fun that Assassins and Company will be on at the same time. Do you have any dream theater roles?
I really love this translation of the play The Lark [by Jean Anouilh]; it’s a Joan of Arc play. I mean, I loved the Shaw one too, but this one—someone gave it to me five years ago and said, “This is a good one for you to read and a good part for you,” so that’s probably why I think it’s one I would like to do. Also, Dot in Sunday in the Park with George. If you’re asking what I actually fantasize about, that one is up there.
The conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
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