Celebrate Arkansas recently chatted with Bret Shuford, who is bringing his one-man show Charming: A Tale of an American Prince to Walton Arts Center this month. This piece appeared in Celebrate’s January issue. Read on to hear the inspiration behind Shuford’s show, why he’s particularly excited to bring it to Northwest Arkansas and more. Charming: A Tale of an American Prince hits the Walton Arts Center stage for one night only on January 16. Get tickets here!
By Marisa Lytle
We always hear the tale from the princess’s point of view, but what about from the prince’s? In his one-man show, Charming: A Tale of an American Prince, Broadway actor Bret Shuford bucks tradition and presents a refreshing take on the fairy tales and musicals we all love.
In Charming, Shuford tells the tale of one prince’s trek from the faraway kingdom of Texas to a castle in The East Village. Shuford’s quest is highlighted by the music of Stephen Sondheim, Steven Lutvak, Prince the Artist, Stephen Schwartz, Rascal Flatts, Sara Bareilles, and more, with a little Disney magic thrown in for good measure. Friendship bracelets, giants, and perhaps even a furry woodland creature help guide this prince along the way. Will he get his “happily ever after”?
According to Shuford, Charming was born out of a cabaret conference he attended at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Wisconsin several years ago. For him, the show became a unique way to tell his own autobiographical story of growing up in southeast Texas and the tension he felt with his family over politics and religion, as well as his early struggles with his sexuality. Performing a one-man show like this, he says, is definitely a vulnerable experience.
“My hope with this show is that people, especially right now, will be lifted up and have some hope and see that there’s a lot that’s in there that you can pull from to live the life you want to live,” Shuford says. “You don’t need other people’s permission. The kingdom you’re looking for is within you. So, how do you become prince or princess of your own kingdom?”
With musical direction by Tracy Stark and direction by Lennie Watts, Charming, A Tale of an American Prince features Shuford, a Texas native bitten by the theater bug at a very young age who has spent the last 20 years working in New York City. He has been seen on Broadway in The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Cirque du Soleil’s Paramour, and Wicked. In addition to working as a Broadway actor, he found a passion for being a content creator, director, choreographer, producer and collaborator with other artists.
“Charming has some really great medleys that Tracy and I put together,” Shuford says. For example, “Something Better Than This” from Sweet Charity mashes up with a song from Into the Woods, and Shuford teases intriguingly that he performs a solo version of “Agony,” which in its original Broadway stage form is a humorous duet sung by two sparring brothers.
For the past year, while Broadway has been shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Shuford hasn’t been able to do any theater work and no acting work other than sending in a few audition tapes for ads and commercials. While he and his husband, Stephen Hanna, were self-isolating, someone made an offer on their New York City apartment, so the couple sold it and moved to Texas to be near Shuford’s family. He says he was very grateful to receive the call from Walton Arts Center asking him to perform Charming at the beginning of this year.
As an acting teacher, Shuford has tried to bolster his students’ morale during the pandemic by likening current events in New York City to the trouble the city faced after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. He was living and working in NYC at the time and says that although that was a really tough time for the city, they got through it, and they’re going to get through it this time, too. Additionally, the advice he gives is this: “I would say, the main thing right now is to be gentle with yourself. Don’t expect to be really on top of creating and working right now. We are grieving and mourning. You have to be gentle with yourself. But also, don’t get lost in that. Every day, try to do two or three more things that take you a step closer to who you’d like to be.”
In looking to the future, Shuford says one of his main goals is to be a dad. Professionally, his dream role would be to create something new that makes an impact and that causes people to say, “Wow, that’s that role that Bret Shuford created.”