256. Broadway Sound Engineer Heather Augustine

Fresh off mixing the Broadway musical The Outsiders to a Tony Award win for Best Sound Design of a Musical for sound designer Cody Spencer, Broadway sound engineer and regular SoundGirls contributor Heather Augustine sits down with Andy and Sean to chat about her long touring career (including Billy Elliot, Phantom of the Opera, Les Misérables, Miss Saigon, and Mean Girls), her transition from touring to subbing on Broadway shows such Funny Girl, SIX, and A Beautiful Noise to mixing her first full-time show on Broadway, and more. This episode is sponsored by Allen & Heath and RCF.

Episode Links:
Heather Augustine On SoundGirls
Clip From Mix Training Video For The 2019 National Tour Of Miss Saigon
NPR Article Featuring Heather
Heather On The SoundGirls Podcast
Glass Slippers Give You Blisters (Book)
Cody Spencer’s Tony Acceptance Speech
Episode 256 Transcript

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Episode 256 Transcript

Transcript

Episode 256 - Heather Augustine

Note: This is an automatically generated transcript, so there might be mistakes--if you have any notes or feedback on it, please send them to us at signal2noise@prosoundweb.com so we can improve the transcripts for those who use them!

Voiceover: You’re listening to Signal to Noise, part of the ProSoundWeb podcast network, proudly brought to you this week by the following sponsors:

Allen & Heath, introducing their new CQ series, a trio of compact digital mixers for musicians, bands, audio engineers, home producers, small venues, and installers that puts ease of use and speed of setup at the heart of the user experience.

RCF, who has just unveiled their new TT+ Audio brand, including the high performance GTX series line arrays and the GTS29 subwoofer. Be sure to check it out at rcf-usa.com. That's rcf-usa.com.

Music: “Break Free” by Mike Green


Andy Leviss: Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Signal to Noise. I'm your host, Andy Leviss, and with me as always is the cheese to my puff, Mr. Sean Walker. What's up, Sean? 

Sean Walker: you, it's What's up dude how are you to  

Andy Leviss: I'm good, I say as always, although actually I missed you last week, so glad to have 

Sean Walker: be back. Bro, 

Andy Leviss: you're recovering from a long couple days of gig? It's that kind of week, man. 

Sean Walker: It sure is, and it's not going to get any less that kind of week. Just, you know, for those who aren't hip, I'll fill in. I got in from my show at 3. 30 this morning, and it is 6. 30 AM here in Seattle while we're recording this. Shoot me in the face. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, Sean's being a champ and taking one for the team today, because we normally try and do these at least a little bit in advance, sometimes a lot in advance, but kind of had an opportunity lined up to do a very timely episode this week, and so I wanted to do that for y'all. Um,  

Sean Walker: Yeahhhhh, let's party. 

Andy Leviss: But yeah, it's been, it's been a week like that for me too. 

I had, uh, it was Juneteenth this week, and uh, there's a big Broadway Celebrates Juneteenth concert in Times Square. And I was working on that as a front of house tech for the awesome Dan Gerhard, who was mixing. And my call time for that was 2. 30 in the morning, and we got done a little, like around 3 in the afternoon. 

Sean Walker: Yeah, 

Andy Leviss: It was a day, we, we lost our generator, uh, between the first and second song of the show because of a fuel leak, which they got. Fixed and back up and running surprisingly fast, but uh, it was, there was a little bit of, it, dude, it literally happened, the, we took a scene and realized that some routing, some patching hadn't been recall safe, so suddenly, an added press feed they added last minute, went away for a second during a speech, and the exact moment I hit the routing You know, cross point on the RIVAGE to patch that output. 

Four different warning messages popped up on the console and he's like, what did you do? What did you do? And I'm like, I just hit, wait, that's his power supply and the UPS is, that wasn't me. And that's bad. 

Sean Walker: Oh, no, dude. 

Andy Leviss: And, and they got it, they got it started. And it's funny. Cause as soon as we weren't at show level, like. 

I think all the way in the front row of the of the plaza you could have heard our our comm squawk box saying what was going on because it was loud enough to get over the band when they were rocking so I don't think anybody had any any misgivings about what happened once they figured it out 

Sean Walker: Oh, no, dude. 

Andy Leviss: yeah but but props to everybody on site who did get it fixed and back up and working quickly and the show you know picked back up and and was great um 

Sean Walker: dude. That's awesome. Well, at least you got to like finish it out and it wasn't like, and we're done. Thanks. Good night. You know, 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, no, it was, it was pretty alright, and uh, yeah, so we did that, but it's, it's been a week of all sorts of, you know, all sorts of crazy excitement here in New York, uh, one of which is the Tony Awards, uh, which, uh, Sean, if you're not familiar, it's, people always say it's the Super Bowl of theater, although I feel like it's more the Oscars of theater. 

It's, it's the big, it's the big event in the theater world for like the two people who don't, who aren't familiar. I know we've talked about it on the show and the comings and goings of the Best Sound Design Awards. And, uh, this week, the reason I'm, I dragged you out of, out of bed so early is, uh, we've got the mixer of the Tony Award winner for this year for Best Sound Design of a Musical. 

The show is The Outsiders and our guest this week is the one and only Heather Augustine. Hey Heather, what's up? 

Heather Augustine: Hey! So happy to be here! 

Andy Leviss: We're so glad to have you. And, you know, um, if, if any of you read Sound Girls, you may know Heather from there. Heather's a regular, uh, contributor there. Like, I was just looking back through, like, how many things you've read. 

Like, you've basically, at this point, written it, like, if, if Shannon Slayden wrote, like, the, the Broadway Sound 101 book, like, you're most of the way through, like, the graduate level book on, like, Diving real into the nitty gritty. 

Heather Augustine: We'll work on that. But yeah, I've, I've, I realized I've been blogging for them since, uh, 2020. So it's been almost five years. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, wow, that's, yeah, there's, there's a lot there, and it's great, like, if anybody ever wants to learn anything about, like, the real, like, inner details of mixing for, you know, musical theatre, like, there's not many better places you can go than, than digging into Heather's writing there. We'll link to it in the show notes. 

Uh, yeah, so you've Kind of been on the list of folks we wanted to talk to for a while, and, credit where it's due, uh, Heather is at the Tony's with her show last week, and, uh, my partner Kate works on the Tony's audio crew every year for the last few years, and, you know, she's texting me with everybody saying hey, you know, while she was over there, and was like, Heather says hey, and like, why the fuck haven't you had her on the show yet? 

And I was like, okay. Because I don't, I don't think I have her contact info, and she was like, well, like, find her on Facebook or something, get her on, so here we are, so, thanks for suggesting that, Kate. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. Thank you, Kate. 

Andy Leviss: Um, so anyway, yeah, why don't we dive in, like, you, like, where, where do you get your start, you know, we'll, we'll do the basics. 

Heather Augustine: Uh, so one of those got into theater, um, actually in middle school. Um, my origin story is I saw Les Mis when, um, our high school was doing it when I was in middle school. And there was, um, Shockingly, there's not enough guys in theater, so a girl was playing Javert and just kind of had that moment of like, She's a badass, I want to do that, like, that's awesome. 

Uh, and then, 

Andy Leviss: the high notes easier for that role. 

Heather Augustine: on it, like, yeah, like, she did a great job. And it, it was something where it's, it's just like they, it's one of those, they didn't do like, Oh, we're doing it as a girl, it's just like, cool, yeah, just, yeah. She's a girl. Do 

Andy Leviss: I mean, Shakespeare did it the other way, so why not? 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, that's fine. Um, so yeah, it was one of those where I fell in love with Les Mis and just kind of had that thing of like, I want to do theater. 

I'm sure my parents would have loved to break the 10th anniversary CD that I had that I played. I'm sure played non stop for several years. Um, but then got into high school and kinda did the cult like, Okay, like, I'd like to do tech the like, I can't sing worth shit. Cool. Like, yeah, let's let's do tech theater. 

And there were actually, um, I loved to read when I was a kid, and there was a book It was a, like, young adult novel called Glass Slippers Give You Blisters, and it was actually about, um, like a high school putting on Cinderella, but it was the lighting crew on that. So, had that and was like, okay, like, yeah, sure, we'll do lighting crew, that'll be fun. 

But then, um, For our musical, uh, my sister and I were gonna do tech stuff, and they were like, great, we can do lighting and we can do sound, so like, you guys pick which one you wanted to do. I originally wanted to do lighting, um, but my sister was older, so she got to pick first, uh, and she picked lighting, so I ended up doing sound, and Never kind of stopped, honestly. 

So, uh, kept going through, I worked for, um, I lived in San Antonio at that point, so worked for the SeaWorld San Antonio Park down in Texas. And then when it came to go to college, was just like, yeah, I guess I just keep doing sound, so I guess I should just keep doing sound. Went to school for sound, and then Found out that you could tour and that I liked mixing and kind of kept doing that and was on tour for 10 years. 

And then after one of those like happened a little bit before the pandemic, where I was just like, okay, one more year, I'm going to do one more year on tour. And then so three, one more years later, finally actually was like, okay, yes, I would like my own place. I would like my own bed. It would be great to not have to move around as much. 

So at the beginning of last year, so 2024, 2023. That was last year. We're doing great. Um, moved to the city and subbed on shows for a while until, um, last September. Uh, Cody was like, hey, got this show? Would you be interested? And said, yeah, sure. And then got to learn what the whirlwind of the whole tech, Tony, all that was for a Broadway musical, which I was like, yeah, I've done tour, this should be fine. 

And then just the sheer length of a Broadway schedule was like, Oh no, this is going to kick my ass. Great. Cool. So, and then we got here. So, 

Sean Walker: When you say tour, you mean with a theater, or you mean like a music tour? 

Heather Augustine: uh, with, uh, theater. So, uh, 

Sean Walker: It's early, and I was trying to figure out how you went from touring with rock bands to winning a fucking Tony in like, 11 months, and I was like, Girl, I'm gonna put my console through a table saw. I'm gonna put my console through a table saw. Like, what is happening here? 

Heather Augustine: No, no. Tour, toured with theater, toured with theater. So. 

Sean Walker: Gotcha, so tons of experience and then 

Andy Leviss: was it, you were at Penn State, right? 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, I went to Penn State, uh, so Curtis Kirk is my professor, 

Andy Leviss: Love me some Curtis. 

Heather Augustine: yes, it's one of those where it's like, literally everyone knows him. They're like, yeah, Curtis, and I'm like, how do you know him? Half the time I never get a straight answer, they're just like, oh, I've known him for ages, and I'm like, does not answer my question. 

I'm sure there's a story in there somewhere. 

Andy Leviss: I was gonna say, USITT is my answer, which is my answer for so many of them. Uh, yeah, no, I mean, Curtis, like, Shannon Slating being in theater is Curtis's fault. 

Heather Augustine: Yes. Yep. 

Andy Leviss: Going way 

Heather Augustine: Curtis gets a lot of blame for a lot of people. 

Andy Leviss: But he has such fabulous hair, though. 

Heather Augustine: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. No, that was, that was the joke in school. You could tell time by his hair because he, he'll like run his hands through it and kind of pull it forward. So it just gets poofier and poofier as the day goes on. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, Curtis has this big, curly, like, long hair. of hair. It's, it's, it's a thing. It's 

Heather Augustine: It starts off slicked back and then it just gets puffier like, just goes out and up as the day goes on. It's, it's 

Andy Leviss: See, since I mostly spend time with him either at, uh, at USITT or we did a show outdoors in Harlem in the heat of the summer a few years ago, I've never seen it anything 

Heather Augustine: Anything but yeah. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, cool. So yeah, so I guess why don't we start like, how did, how did you make that jump from like, once you graduated Penn State to get it on tour? 

Like, how did that happen for you? 

Heather Augustine: Uh, so actually there were a handful of Penn Staters who were already on tour. Um, so, uh, my first tour was Billy Elliot, which, um, we had a recent Penn State grad, Justin Stashu, he was mixing it, um, and then a very recent Penn State grad, uh, Joshua Hummel, he took over for Justin because both Justin and, uh, the A2 were leaving. 

And, um, Combination of things because, uh, Josh and I were dating at that point. And so they were like, cool, we kind of need a girl for Billy Elliot because there's, um, I want to say a ballet ensemble of eight girls who were like 16 and younger, most of which were eight or nine years old. And. One of the cues for that track was, okay, you're going to go into their dressing room, you're going to put tap mics on them, so there's going to be a girl who's in her underwear with her tights around her ankles, you're going to hold the tap mics at her ankles while she pulls up her tights, and then puts on her leotard. 

And so you'd have, like, we'd go to some cities, and they're like, well, why does this have to be a girl? Like, 65 year old, kind of semi grouchy stagehands and they're like, yeah, why couldn't like somebody do it? And I would tell them what that key was. And they're like, Oh no, no, no, no, no. Nevermind. Cool. Okay. 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Got it. Um, so they, they were looking for, um, a female A2. And, uh, I had Graduated that January? December? Whatever, whenever you graduate on that one. Um, and had known that I wanted to go to tour, so that was one of those where they were like, Cool! So, you also go to Penn State, we've had decent experience with all of these other Penn Staters, And, yeah, let's like, sure, first tour, great, let's go for it, why not? 

So, worked out well, I really, I, One of those, love touring, still love it, happy to be off the road. I have a hammock that's out on my balcony that I absolutely love and I miss if I leave my apartment for more than a week. But at the same time as the like, I enjoy popping back out to tour to go do that and one of those kind of miss the life, but at the same time, happy to not be out there. 

But yeah, it's, I, I took to tour like a fish in water and 10 years later it was like, okay, it's been, it's been long enough. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, I mean, there's something for like, you know, having a hammock on tour and finding up two road cases or like a wardrobe box to like hang it in, but a balcony is a lot nicer. 

Heather Augustine: Well it, so the hammock I have is a single point one and that's, this is actually about 10 years in the making because there's a little shop on Granville Island in Vancouver that was selling these single point hammocks and Saw them on my second tour, which was Wizard of Oz, and was just like, oh, like, can I convince our rigger to hang an additional motor point in Ampland for me? 

Did not manage to make that work, but I really tried. So when I got my apartment, it was like, I am getting one of those hammocks, so when somehow was able to find that shop again, I was just like, I would like a hammock, please, and actually I got another one for the theater. Pretty much like as soon as we got into tech was like, I'm getting another hammock, we're gonna need this. 

Andy Leviss: That's the secret, if you want to help win a Tony Award, you gotta have a hammock at the theater. 

Heather Augustine: Get a hammock, yep. 

Sean Walker: see where you went wrong is you didn't offer 

Andy Leviss: like HAHAHAHAHAHA 

Sean Walker: you didn't offer to get the head rigger a hammock You should have asked him to hang two points one for him and one for you and then you would have been in like 

Heather Augustine: You know, yes, yes, that was, that was baby Heather did not know yet. 

Sean Walker: Right. 

Heather Augustine: She's learned, she's learned, believe 

Sean Walker: Can you hang an extra point for me? No, how about two points and I'll bring you a coffee 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, that would be like, yeah, handle of whatever you want that you can sit in the hammock and drink. On the upside, if you get yourself a pickle, you can just motor yourself on up so nobody can talk to 

Sean Walker: Like, totally. 

Andy Leviss: Although, that's a real slow, awkward exit when you want to make the exit from the conversation, just 

Heather Augustine: Honestly, either like slow and awkward or epic and dramatic. It's whichever way you want to play it. 

Andy Leviss: It depends if you queue up Carmina Burana or not. Um, but yeah, no, I say it's so funny, like, your story has like so many names of like, of like, folksignarts here, and it's like such a small, small, like, although it's funny, you did, you, you did like the backwards Justin Stashew, because the first tour he mixed was Wizard of Oz, which I was the assistant designer on for Shannon, which was, that was an epically ridiculous, Like some of the show reports are some of my favorite show reports ever because it was like the like the one nighter bus and truck all through like parts of Canada where like sometimes the mountain pass road is snowed out so you have to cancel a city because the only other route is a 23 hour drive around the mountain. 

Heather Augustine: Yep. Yeah, I heard some of those stories. It was one of those where he's like, you sure you want to go on tour? Here's something what it's like. Yeah, it's kind of funny because people will be like, oh, how do you know Justin? He's like, he taught me QLab when I was a clueless little freshman sitting there working on a show and he was just like, yeah, go do this. 

Cool. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah and then Justin's could be in and Kodia Do you know, do you know what, what tour Cody got his start on? 

Heather Augustine: He has told me But I don't, was it American Idiot? 

Andy Leviss: Oh, no no, start. I met Cody when Cody was mixing Sesame Street Live. 

Heather Augustine: That was, yes. 

Andy Leviss: Because we were, we were both mixing, mixing opposing tours of that and, and we like, we met through like mutual friends across tours and I, I actually think he was mixing the tour that my girlfriend at the time was in the cast of. Uh, like that next season. 

So I've known Cody a long, long time 

Heather Augustine: Did they do it like Broadway tours? Like how you have like the Gazelle and the Rafiki tour for Lion King. Did you have like the Big Bird and the Elmo tour? 

Andy Leviss: not quite that creative. So they've just got the East coast, the West coast, the theater and the international. 

Heather Augustine: Okay. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah. Um, but yeah, no, that was, 

Sean Walker: Big Bird's got his 90s gangster rap on, East Coast vs. West Coast 

Andy Leviss: Right. That's, I was on West Coast, which meant we closed with two weeks in Honolulu with like four days off in the middle. And like the locals took us out for like a barbecue on a sandbar where like, you know, we boated out and then we're like on dry land to start the day. 

And by the time food was served, we were like up to our waists and in water. It was really cool. 

Sean Walker: That's awesome, dude. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. Those are the days on tour where you're just like, yeah, all right. I picked the right career. 

Andy Leviss: yeah, it was, they knew what they were doing too. Cause like a month before that I was like on the verge of quitting, but then it was like, Oh, but we have two weeks in 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. They dangle that carrot of like, Hawaii's coming. Just stick around. 

Andy Leviss: And did we mention we'll, we'll let you, you gotta pay for the hotel, but we'll cover your flight up to a week after we close. 

So a bunch of, like, I ended up not, but a bunch of folks ended up just like paying for the hotel for an extra week and then flying home a week later. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. Yeah, 

Andy Leviss: okay, so, so get him back on like constructive stuff, talk that people want to hear about instead of us just like talking about like friends and stuff. 

Um, do you want to talk a little more about that transition from, uh, from the road to. Broadway. I like, I know it started as many do you started like sobbing on shows, right? 

Heather Augustine: so that was, uh, um, I left, so how I actually met Cody was, the last tour I did was the Mean Girls tour, which Cody was the associate on, um, and we did about six months pre pandemic and then coming back, um, I stayed on it for about a year and change, um, but I reached a point. Probably when we were about six months in where I was like, don't think I can mix this show for another year. 

Like this, just somewhere deep in my soul, this is slowly killing me. I gotta go. Just have to go. Um, so I left the tour with about 6, 5, 6 months left on it. And it was like, it was the nice part of the tour where they did, um, it was like, uh, I think two, three weeks in Denver, four weeks in la, four weeks in San Francisco. 

And I think the worst stretch was they had four one week sits tossed in there and then they finished up in Florida. Um, so it was the, okay, if I decide to stay, I get the cushy part of the tour. If I decide to leave, somebody else has a very enticing, cushy tour that they get to just. Do a couple months, finish off, call it good. 

And then I finally reached the point where I was like, okay, yeah, one, one more tour is now done time to go. Um, so I left the tour and, um, my dad actually, cause my parents are both have had normal jobs their entire lives, are very understanding of the schedule, but don't actually understand what it is. So my dad definitely did the whole, cool. 

You're leaving a job. That still has time left on it. to go to the city where you don't have anything officially lined up. Cool. Yeah. Fine with this. Great. Let us know when you have to move back in with us in like six months. Great. Um, so moved to the city. I, uh, subletted. Yeah, 

Sean Walker: On that phone call, you could just hear him moving the boxes out of your old room. He's like, It'll be fine. It'll be fine. Nope. I already got you. It's all cleared out. It's fine. It's fine. 

Heather Augustine: no, it's, so my stuff, uh, has been in the closet of my parents Technically, it's my room. It's actually the guest bedroom for the entire time that I was on tour. So my dad, like when I said I'm moving to New York, was kind of like, yeah, pack it up, everything, finally, out, get out of the house. We're gone. Great. 

It's been here for, yeah, it's been here nine years too long. Let's go. Ahem. But then he was just like, but you don't have a job. Like, okay, put it back in the closet. Fine. Um, but it was trying to explain to them where New York is very much the, it's easier to get work if you're here and you say, I'm available. 

I can be there tomorrow. I like, I am physically here. Not the, Oh, I'll be there soon. 

Sean Walker: Man, that's all cities. That's all places. Like, hey, 

Andy Leviss: And, and on that note, I know like looking through some of your blogs, you and I had very similar experiences on a sub situation during like the craziness of COVID. Although you had the, the scariest way it could go. And I had the really cushy way it could go. 

Heather Augustine: Uh, the Peter Pan goes wrong. Yep. 

Andy Leviss: because I got on a call like literally and I knew like I knew everybody else who got like the call had gone all around town looking for when the skin of our teeth was at the Beaumont in like 2022 looking for somebody to come in shadow like two or three performances the closing weekend of the show because Everybody on the mix, except for Moe, who was the regular mixer on it, had tested positive. 

Most of the A2s, like a new A2 was training on the track, like, on the show, the other A2 was talking through his track. And it went around 

Heather Augustine: domino to fall. 

Andy Leviss: yeah, and it was like, hey, can you come and watch like Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and then either Moe will test positive and you're gonna mix the closing show on Sunday, or you'll get a call Sunday morning to tell you to stay home and you'll get. 

paid anyway because we're not gonna let you know till the morning when the COVID tests come in. And yeah, shadowed that show a couple times, mixed part of it like once, you know, with Mo there, and then thankfully he stayed negative and I didn't have to mix it. But, uh, you, you, I believe, have a story, 

Heather Augustine: No, 

Andy Leviss: sort of similar, but a little, a little more insane. 

Heather Augustine: yeah, I have a, uh, very similar one where this, so this was 2023. So. Getting to the end of people aren't really testing as much. Um, but that was, got the call from, uh, Dylan Cody, who know him because he did production for Mean Girls. And, um, he gave me a call and that was, and that's one of those things where like, if people know you're in the city, it's the like, Hey, I know you're not on a show, so you might be free. 

And I think it was maybe 11 o'clock in the morning, got the call of like, Hey, So, Jon's not feeling well. Uh, the A2 who can mix the show is on vacation this week. Um, do you mind coming in? Uh, we'll kind of like have you sit behind the box, kind of watch the mix, see the show. If things go sideways and it's COVID, we'll have you step in and mix the show. 

So it was the like, okay, great, like, you called me, like, I have enough time to Go get dressed and shower, because I'm definitely in my pajamas, because I didn't have work today until this point. And get down to the theater and got to the theater and they're like, So Jon's positive, how do you feel about mixing a show? 

And Thankfully, I'd actually seen the show, I think it was two weeks earlier, with a friend, and it's Peter Pan Goes Wrong, so it was like, worst 

Andy Leviss: right there in the 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, if I mess up, we can I'm sure we can play this off as it's just part of the show, and hopefully no one's gonna know too much. So yeah, that was I had, uh, so, John Sibley, who was the mixer, and then David Fowler, who was the A2, um Apparently, John had made fun of Dave earlier because, um, he had gone, after he had learned the mix, he had gone through and cleaned up his script and just made it more legible, whatever he needed to do for it, and John had been like, Like, you know how to mix the show. 

Why are you cleaning this? Why are you putting in this extra work? And his was the script that I used. And I just sat there with some dots being like, okay, like here's a cue light. Here is this, here's something I have to pay attention to like here and took some extra notations and stuff with some post its and put it on there. 

And John was like, Guess I gotta apologize to Fodder, cuz that definitely came in handy. Um, but yeah, it was, mixed the show with, uh, Dylan standing next to me, and he was like, Do you want me to take cues? Do you want me, like, what do you want me to do? How do you, and it's just like, Just let me go if I get too far off the rails. Flip a page, take a cue, throw a fader, whatever you gotta do. Fine. But we got through it, it was fine, it's definitely one of those where you're like, I am not mixing this line by line, we have, like, the next three lines are up, and we are going from there. And actually, Fodder had great notes in his script about, like, this person's out, like, they don't talk for a while, so he'd have a notation where you could take their mic out. 

like, this is perfect, 

Andy Leviss: Oh, nice. 

Heather Augustine: job. Oh, it was, had I not had that script, it would have gone much differently. 

Andy Leviss: That's, I, yeah, you know, I'm remembering I had one other, like, years ago, my very first show when I got to New York was the Off Broadway original production of Altered Boys I took over. And then being, And, and being my very first show, it was also the very first show I got fired from for basically for, for being too young and naive and trying to mix a show that wasn't in a state of cast turnover where one could mix it very tightly and trying to mix it too tightly and, but not knowing not to do that and not knowing how to communicate things to a stage manager who was hearing a show inside a closed booth. 

And three years later, they got so far down the list of like subs and alumni in a, in a medical emergency that I got, thankfully I had a day heads up that it might happen. And then, but got a call at like about noon on a Saturday. Hey, get here as fast as you can for the mat, just like, come in quietly if it's already started, watch as much as you can, and you're mixing tonight. 

Almost three years to the day after getting fired from the show, and I was like, well, what are they gonna do, fire me? Like, can't, can't be worse. And thankfully, I had both, the board recording I still had on my iPad was the original cast, and all the tempos had kind of gradually slowed down over the years, so I was like, cramming it the night before. 

Like, at a much faster tempo, so it was, like, almost in slow motion. And, 

Heather Augustine: okay. I got time to think. All 

Andy Leviss: yeah, well, and the other thing, which is what reminded me of it, is thankfully I couldn't find my mix script, because I, like, buried it in a deep corner of my apartment, because they had changed just enough of certain things that if I had gone off my script instead of the current mixer script, I would have been hosed. 

And, uh, And that was one where I don't, you know, Jake 

Heather Augustine: I don't think we've met, but no uphib 

Andy Leviss: Scudder, another, you know, long time fixture in the Broadway world, um, and Jake and I had known each other online forever, and I get there to like mix that, that evening show, and I'm sitting there like in between shows, just like going through the recording, going through the mixers, And then as we're getting ready for show call, the company manager comes in and is like, Hey, so this is Jake, he was supposed to start training to sub on the show today, do you mind if since he's here and we forgot to tell him not to bother showing up if he just hangs with you? 

And I literally tell him like, Hey Jake, good to finally meet you, I'm Andy, um, don't pay attention to anything I do because I have not mixed the show in three years and the last time I did they fired me, and um, don't go too far, I might need your hands. it was on a Heritage 3000, there was no auto there was yeah, there was no automation because it was like, it was on a Heritage 3000 back in like, you know, 2005, and like, there were like, band changes for like, every song notated in the script and just lots of like, like the mix was like, relatively, at that point I learned that lesson not to mix it too tight line by line and like, it's five guys, they're mostly on stage the whole time as long as you know when one's going off stage for a gig. 

You know, a costume change or, you know, a mop down with a towel, you were fine. But it was, that was pure adrenaline for that show. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, 

Andy Leviss: So 

Heather Augustine: well, to remember, it's like, nobody, the audience does not care if you're mixing line by line, they just want to hear the lines, like, as long as you get that up, that's fine. 

Andy Leviss: yeah, at a certain point, a show is better than a perfect show. It's we've, we've said that so many times on this episode that like sometimes, you know, perfect can be the enemy of, of done and survived. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, 

Sean Walker: Okay, for those of us that 

Andy Leviss: and, and so, but it, 

Sean Walker: Sorry, I must have some lag. I keep talking right over the top of you. I apologize. For those of us that don't do theater, what is line by line? Is that like literally bringing up each microphone for each performer as they talk and then back down? Like you're, 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, 

Sean Walker: you're the doogan as it were? 

Heather Augustine: yeah, mic down when they're done, so it's, it's trying to get it, the idea is to try to avoid comb filtering and that kind of stuff so that you have as few mics up as possible. over the course of the show, but, or like if people are singing into each other's faces, you might just pick one mic instead of using both of them because, again, comb filtering, all that fun phasing. 

Sean Walker: Yeah, that makes sense. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, like, romantic duets with, like, choreography always get to be, like, I, I, my, my second show after Alter Boys was this show called Five Course Love, uh, that was, it was five scenes, uh, that all took place. It was a couple on a date in a restaurant with a waiter, and it was a three person cast, and it was, that show was like a master class in, like, mixing for hats and mixing for duets, and yeah, there were, like, numbers where it was, like, you know, they, like, sing in each other's face and then spin out and then come back in each other's face and sing, and it's, yeah, if you've got Two omni mics on people's foreheads in that situation when they get real close to each other suddenly you're all gonna sound like this and then as they get apart it sounds normal so you have to figure out whose mic you can use for when and you're like basically following the choreography along with one of the faders and like you know fading you know like if the girl's spinning out you might be like fading her mic out as she comes into the guy's face and then fading it back in smoothly as she goes away and it's 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, 

Andy Leviss: it's a lot that I learned so much on that show. 

Heather Augustine: it's its own bit of choreography, just figuring out where you gotta push, where you gotta pull. And when it's just like, cool, you can just go away cause you're real loud all on your own. 

Andy Leviss: Uh 

Sean Walker: Do you, do you utilize something like Dugan at all in this scenario or is that just like not even the right tool for the job? 

Heather Augustine: You are the Duke and Mixer. 

Sean Walker: You are The Dugan 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, it's like, Dan's got some algorithms that aren't in like the stock ones and consoles that are a little better suited to music, but the problem is even like, concert music would be one thing, but theater, because there are so many of those decisions of knowing which mic is going to sound better, like, because it's going to guess on the fly, whereas like, once you like, you'll spend time in tech and like, first try just You know, person A's mic, then try person B's mic and see which one sounds more natural, or like, if the guy's taller than the girl, like, odds are, like, if you were to use her mic, he's singing right into her forehead, so like, that wouldn't work, but like, where she's singing, she's actually probably about the same distance from his mic that his mouth is from his, so you gotta play with that a little bit, that like, a dugan's just not gonna know, 

Sean Walker: because it's only picking up what's the loudest thing is, you're trying to figure out what the best sounding thing is. Yeah, that makes sense. 

Andy Leviss: or at least the, the least worst sounding thing. 

Heather Augustine: Best for the scenario. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, yeah, situational best. We're great. We're mixing on a curve here. 

Sean Walker: We're mixing on a curb. 

Heather Augustine: Dunbee's perfect again. Yep, that same thing. We're just like, yes, we have sound that this was the best we could do for this. Yes, that's 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, and like, and yeah, like, I mean, line by, like, we'll, I'm gonna let, there's a, one of Heather's early, uh, posts on Soundgirls was on line by line mixing, and there's a little video clip in there of one of her tours that we'll, we'll link to, so folks can check that out if they haven't seen it. It's, you know, watching somebody who's good at it, which Heather is great at it, is, you know, is kind of a masterclass in. 

Like, I remember when the Avid consoles first came out, going to an AES conference and meeting Scoville there, and talking to him, and like, being like, oh, like, you've got 16 DCAs, but like, there's only 8 on the surface, is there any way to like, do a custom or something to get more than 8, you know, at a time, and his eyes bug out, and he's like, fuck, you need more than 8, like, simultaneously 4, and I was like, oh, Muffin, you don't, and like, I start trying to explain it to him, and just, 

Sean Walker: You called Scoville Muffin 

Andy Leviss: no, I did not. 

No, I 

Sean Walker: tell me you looked right at Scoville on the AES floor and said, Oh Muffin. 

Andy Leviss: No. I still have a career in audio, so no, I did not. Um, well that, so that means that we talked a little bit about like that like emergency insane worst case scenario subbing, um, for, for folks that, because Broadway's a unique situation where There are dozens of shows running at a time, I actually lost a trivia contest grossly underestimating how many Broadway theaters there are, it's somewhere in like the 40s I want to 

Heather Augustine: Oh, yeah, I would have estimated somewhere like low 30s, but yeah, 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, yeah, there's a lot more than you think and you start listing them all and you're like, oh yeah, um, and, and doing eight shows a week, like there's both subs for emergencies and also just like people need days off, people need time off. So, subbing is a thing that, you know, it's like, it's, like in the rock world, it's like, you know, it's like there's an emergency and somebody will come in and cover a tour, but it's a different thing, and Broadway, we're actually, like, very, and, and also because the mix is line by line and so dynamic, there's, like, a lot more involved in being able to cover a show than just, like, yeah, listen to the music and kind of, you know, just don't fuck it up. 

So, like, like, Heather, do you want to talk? 

Heather Augustine: it good. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, I mean, do you want to talk a little bit? 

Sean Walker: it's more like, hey dude, this is the person that also knows this show well and can knock this out of the park for you. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, so do you, I mean, do you want to talk a little about that and, like, Explain to folks, like, how it works to, like, come into a show as a sub? 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, it's, uh, depending on the show, being a sub is kind of you have to be able to switch between different styles of show very quickly, because depending on the show, you'll have a different training time where If you are actually trained and not just been like, Hey, here's the show, here's the scripts, mix it now. 

Um, so on Funny Girl, I had, um, I think it was about 20 shows in the theater. So that's going from you're sitting, watching the show to you're mixing the full show. And we also have, uh, for any, uh, Uh, shows that are on DiGiCo consoles. There's a studio in the New York area as well that has, um, a full SD7 console that they can set up a multitrack. 

You can even do video in some cases, and you can basically go in with a show file and mix through the show in real time. So like when you're throwing faders, you're actually getting the feedback of, oop, threw that up too late, or like, okay, oh, this This is the wrong person. Great. I had the wrong number in my script. 

I should fix that. And you have that in a safe environment of a studio so you can practice a little bit before you get into the theater and then have to do it in front of a thousand plus people. Um, so had so on Funny girl. I had, uh, five days in the studio and 20 shows. Um, on six I had. I think it was also five days in the studio but then, um, a week, so eight shows in the theater because they're like, oh, it's a shorter show, it's a little bit easier to mix, um, and I was actually filling in, um, for a month on Funny Girl, so I had time to be in the studio before I could actually be in the theater, so I basically, um, used one of my shows to watch the show, was in the studio for all five sessions, and then came into the theater and had seven more shows to learn. 

And six has, were, kind of like, a quarter of the way in there's a complicated part, and then like, a third of the way in there's a complicated part. So I was like, okay, I'm just gonna start mixing, we're gonna keep going, and I'll tell you when I have to tap out. And then got through both of those complicated parts, and was like, I should be able to do the rest. 

Like, I should be fine. And like, the mixer was just like, okay, like, keep going. And it's one of those where it's just like the show with love if you really don't know what you're doing. They're like, okay, cool. You've missed enough. We're stepping in now. But for that first show was one of those just on pure adrenaline made it through the whole show, which was actually nice because I like if I can mix a couple shows, and then have the mixer mix a show so that I can go I can listen to what the show is supposed to be again and also go, Oh, okay, I've been mixing this thing this way, but you use this choreography or like, you hit the cue at this point instead, so that'll be helpful when I have to go back and mix it. 

Andy Leviss: Oh, I like that. I've, I've never thought to do that on shows I've, I've subbed or taken 

Heather Augustine: it's, it's nice to have that moment of, I don't have to worry about mixing this and also the, Oh, that's how you do it! Okay, I've been just fumbling around, but you actually know how this goes, so great. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, to like, go back and watch, like, what, because like, watching when you haven't had fingers on faders is, is one thing, but there's always like, you reach that point where you kind of glaze over and you're like, I just, I gotta do it. But yeah, going back and watching once you've done it, that, that's really valuable. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, it's very helpful. Um, and then, um, on Beautiful Noise, um, we didn't do any time in the studio, and I think, I think I had 24 shows. Um, to learn that one, but that was, so, learning Beautiful Noise was kind of a weird moment because I had already had other sub work scheduled, so it ended up where I, for, I think it was four weeks, was just kind of fitting. 

Beautiful Noise in any time I didn't have another show. So it ended up where I did Tuesday nights at Funny Girl. On Wednesday, I would do the work call and a matinee at six. And then I would go to Beautiful Noise in the evening and mix that show. And I did that for, I think, three or four weeks. And it was like, Oh, great. 

We're going from stereotypical, like classic musical theater to kind of a little bit of like a rock pop concert to Neil Diamond. Okay, yeah, this is fine. And you just have to go like, okay, great, like, this is what we're doing. Note your scripts very well, because, 

Andy Leviss: End your calendar. 

Heather Augustine: yes, and your calendar, the number of times that I looked up show schedules to make sure that I was going to the right theater for the right call time was, it was borderline obsessive. 

But I always made it to the right spot, so. 

Andy Leviss: That's good. We, I'm, I'm not going to name names, but many years ago, there was somebody we all know was, was doing the full time something between two or three different shows. And I forget whether it's just showed up at the run, I think accidentally double booked themselves on two shows. And, and I. Yeah, and it was, thankfully, like, enough other folks were in town. 

Like, I think somebody who also covered that show was shadowing another show by the same designer that day, so they were like, Hey, you're not going to shadow this show tonight, we need you to go mix the other show, because somebody else done messed up. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. I'm a nerd. So I had spreadsheets of like, everything was color coded and was like, had the show schedule and was like, I'm here for this, here for that, here for this, here for that. Just 

Andy Leviss: Have you ever had that moment, like, of a downbeat, where you suddenly were like, Oh wait, no, different show, different show, hold 

Heather Augustine: wrong one. Throw the other fader. Yeah. Yeah. It was like, I'll still have that moment where the cue light goes off and it's like, okay, let's go. It'll be fine. It's going to be great. It's going to be great. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, yeah, it's, it's a wild, yeah, it's a wild thing we do, we do in the Broadway world. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, it is, it is fun. But I reached a, actually, Cody found me at a very good moment. 'cause I'd been like, oh, I'll just like, kind of settle in. I'll sub for a while, do all that. Um, but right around September was, I just felt like I was getting pulled in every single direction. Had absolutely no control over my own schedule. 

'cause that's kind of what it is as a sub, is that. You're there when people need you, but when everyone is busy, you just feel like you're completely elastic and you are almost reaching that breaking point where the elastic is gonna snap. And he was like, hey, wanna do a full time show? And I was like, yes, yes, actually I do, that would be fantastic right now. 

I would just like to know where I'm going to be a month in advance so I can plan a vacation. 

Andy Leviss: So, I mean, before we run out of time, I do want to talk about that, because now you, you, you know, Tech the Outsiders opened up, and then just, Uh, took it to the Tony Awards, which is a unique, so like I know if even the folks at home who don't like see Broadway shows, you know, often if at all, you know, here in New York, like a lot of y'all like watch the Tonys and like see what happens, but like the, the machine that goes on behind the scenes to make all those performances work is bonkers. 

Do you want to talk a little bit about what that's like from the show perspective and like bringing a number from your show onto the Tonys and how that works? 

Heather Augustine: for for us it got even a little bit more complicated because we have a rain sequence in our show, uh, that in the show is like about five, six minutes of active rain on stage. It's great for the mics. Don't you worry about that. That's fun. Um, and they wanted that still not 100 percent clear if it was our show creatives or the, um, the Tony Fogarty. 

creatives that wanted the rumble for that, um, so we brought a rain bar and set that up, and, um, we have, the floor has, um, EPDM on it, which is kind of like that playground, rubberish material, um, and so the creatives want that because they kick it up as they're dancing and all of that stuff, so it's not just like, great, we're rolling out some set pieces, and doing a show and then we all walk off stage, it's the no, so we've got a whole bunch of extra shit that's on the stage with all of this, um, like pellet, rubber pellets that are floating around and we also, they built a trough for them to do the rumble so all the rain would just go into the trough and they could take that and push that upstage. 

The, the amount of planning between our creative team, our props people, all of that to just figure out How we were going to get us on and off the stage, I think, is a little bit more than most shows have to do. Um, but, I think we were the last ones to perform, because they're like, we're not dealing with water for anybody else. 

Because, uh, the A2 for Water for Elephants Jamie, he was just like, when are you guys performing? Because we want to go before you, because none of the acrobats want to be potentially slipping on a wet stage. And I was like, no, no, get that, completely get that. Um, yeah. But yeah, that was the whole plan. Um, for us, for sound, it was a little bit easier because, um, we were just, like, great, here are the people who are going to be in mics, this is what their mic rigs look like, um, so like, Kate and everyone at the Tonys took care of building those mic rigs and having them ready, and I was there for a camera blocking rehearsal where they So, um, yeah. 

Like, they go through with the creatives and figure out, okay, this is what we're doing and this is where we want the cameras to be between, um, our creative team from the show and then the, uh, people from the Tonys figuring out these are the cameras we're using, these are the shots we want to get, whether it's wide, whether it's close, whether we have someone on stage following, they did a big portion of that for the Rumble where it was, like, up close and personal for them as they're fighting, um, and they, I think they had something It's like six minutes to set it up and three minutes to take it down. 

So they had in the rehearsal studio, they had to basically do proof of concept for all the people from the Tonys for the, we can roll up the carpet that has all the EPDM in it. We can get the trough, like that can go upstage in the time period with six people, like it is doable. So you had that kind of the rehearsal period for that proof of concept actually being in the theater. 

And doing blocking rehearsals and all of that. And then for me, for sound, um, it was basically making sure I was there to help people get into mics for the first time and they knew what was ha or that our cast knew what was happening with that. Um, Jason Crystal, who was mixing for the theater audience at the Tony's, one of those like hung out by him for a little bit and he had a question or two about the mix and it was one of those like, yeah, do this, it'll be fine. 

It's not quite the show, but it'll be fine. Have fun! Um, and then also pop, pop, popping out to the broadcast truck, because that's, there's multiple things where it's like, you have the system that's actually in the theatre for the people who are at the Tonys physically, and then you have the broadcast for everyone who's watching the Tonys, which is a completely different thing. 

So, popping between those, and then, um, Actually, I think it might have been Kate that when they gave us the mics back at the end, she was like, because in the broadcast truck was there when they ran the Rumble with the Rain, and you just hear Ponyboy like, he's shouting, he's yelling, and then just hearing that as the water gets into the mic, and so everyone was super nice when we got the mics back, they're like, yeah, we tested it, it's fine, like, we got the water out, like, it's got a silica packet in there, and instead of there being like, oh, no, no, these mics are very resilient, you do not know, it's, It is fine. 

They do five minutes under this water and then they still have to sing another 20 minutes of the show. 

Andy Leviss: what mix are y all using? 

Heather Augustine: uh, we're using DPA 6061s. 

Andy Leviss: Gotcha. 

Heather Augustine: So yeah, it's, they, they work really well. The actors have learned really well how to flick the water out of their mics and all that stuff. But yeah, it's, it was one of those where they were, they're like, yeah, the water got into it and it's like, Don't you worry, it's, it's fine. 

Um, and then for the actual performance, they come back, um, in the morning. It's kind of designed so like you can come back in the morning, do a rehearsal. Shows have enough time if they want to be really mean and do a matinee. And then you can go and then to have the actual award ceremony. So they give you the call time of this is when the bus is going to pick you up. 

So you guys need to be in costumes and ready. Head to the theater. Pick up whoever is in the audience watching for the Tonys, which was our three people who were singing, um, so like, they get out of their seats, get into their costumes, do the show, and then I know for, um, our pony boy, um, who's the main character, one of those where it's like, you, Because they have the camera shot of all of them running off stage afterwards. 

And he's like running off stage, like taking off his shirt already because he has to like quick change back into his stuff so he can get back out into the audience. So it's one of those where it's just like, there's no time, just run, run, run and get on out of there. But yeah, it's a well oiled machine. 

That 

Andy Leviss: It's, they, yeah. They've been doing it a long time. They figured it out, like, uh, yeah, like the, like Kate's been doing it a few years, but like Jenny Montgomery's been on it forever and, and Trish and Skip and everybody on that team, or they've, yeah, they've got that figured out. And it's funny, like, I know like sometimes like chills will come in and be like, okay, so we need like all this time to like, you know, get the packs like into costumes and stuff, and it's like. 

No, you're all sharing backs between the numbers. There's a lot of y'all. Like, we'll get it to you as soon as we can, but you're not, you're not getting it an hour before half. Like, 

Heather Augustine: Yeah, not how this works here. 

Andy Leviss: um, cool. And, and yeah, so, and then, and you guys won the award and, and Cody, uh, um, uh, that was, that was one of the awards that they do on like the pre show that streams on Pluto rather than like the main over the air show. And, um, Cody in typical Cody fashion, uh, Didn't get bleeped in time, but did black out the feed in a panic, apparently, for about 30 seconds, dropping an f bomb. 

Heather Augustine: so Cody is like, he got through like the first round of things and then dropped an f bomb. You see, like, you see his face, like, hand in front of his face, wide eyed of the oh shit moment. And then the entire feed goes to black for probably, I want to say about at least a minute or two. 

And that was honestly If you're gonna have a first, uh, an acceptance speech for your first Tony, that's the way to go. Like, he was infamous. We have stickers. Our, our, uh, programmer, Steven Jensen, he basically, by the time he got into the Uber at the end of the night after the party, already had a proof from the sticker company of this is what it's gonna look like for the stickers. 

Andy Leviss: That's my kind of person. 

Heather Augustine: Yes. We had, um, we, like, jokingly filled out the FCC complaint form, um, on behalf of Mike Tracy, our production guy, who was just like, As a father of two children, I expect the Tony Awards to be a classy event! But yeah, so it's We will be getting mileage out of that for years to come and I cannot wait. 

That's something where people are just like, congratulations, and I'm like, honestly, I'm not sure if it was better to win the Tony or to have Cody break the broadcast. Like it's, it's a very close race on that one. Like we're all so excited. Yeah. So excited. 

Sean Walker: There's gonna be a lot of fun had for that one 

Heather Augustine: that was, we'll, we'll get more mileage out of that than we probably will 

Sean Walker: Totally, totally. 

Heather Augustine: But yeah, that was, it was a very fun night because It was one of those where it's like some of those, um, where it's like some of the words you can kind of predict where like we were up for best choreography and it's just like if Illinois That's The Dance Show does not win for best choreography, that just kind of sucks. 

So you had like there was a handful of ones where it's like we're probably not gonna win and then there were some where it's like because everyone Had Hell's Kitchen as a favorite and we were like, maybe, and then we went, the entire room just went nuts. It was, it's one of those where it's like, that's, that was an amazing way to have a first show that was mine to mix to originate on Broadway and having that whole moment was just kind of like, all right, cool. 

Like, Let's just go. 

Sean Walker: You go, girl, 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. 

Sean Walker: that's awesome. Congratulations. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah. Like everything's downhill from there, 

Heather Augustine: I mean, one of those where you're just like, yeah, we'll, we'll see if we can maintain, like, this is, this is the point to get up to, but yeah, I told Cody where I'm going to get like a little half sized Tony replica made for myself. I'm, I'm very excited about that, but yeah. Yeah, it was 

Andy Leviss: I'll have to, I'll also reach out to Cody and see if we can get him on too, but I feel, I don't know if podcasts are entirely Cody's, , Cody's thing. 

Heather Augustine: Tell him he can swear! He's fine! And then he's good! 

Andy Leviss: Actually, yeah. That's a solid sales pitch. And I am, I'm gonna, I'm gonna link to the, the official video of. I haven't actually watched the clip they put online to see if they've censored it or not, but we'll link to it and let folks 

Heather Augustine: I think there I honestly haven't watched that one either. I need to because I don't know the actual phrase. And there's enough time where people are just like, What did he say? And it's like, something with fuck in it. Like, I don't remember what it was. 

Andy Leviss: yeah, and I know at the end he says, Thank you and don't cancel me! Yeah, 

Heather Augustine: Well, in all the post interviews, he's just like, I honestly blacked out. I don't remember what I said or where I got to. So, thanks everybody again, because I don't know who I actually thanked. I had a friend who was just like, his fiancée must be so mad at him. It's like, no, no, no, Victoria knew what she was getting into. 

Like, it's, she could not be surprised at all. 

Andy Leviss: yeah, no, Cody's a good dude though, he's, he's Been around and doing this for a long time, and I'm really proud to see a friend have won that, and proud to now, you know, know you too, and the big part, you know, you played it. Because that's the thing, it's always like, it's the design, but it's also so much the hands of the mixer, and it's very much a team award. 

Heather Augustine: Yeah. It's, it's him trusting me to be like, okay, this is what we want. Now you go with it. But yeah, it's, I'm, I was very excited for him. Cause he, the entire design team put a lot of love into this show, which like talking with one of the composer was like, everyone is just being a little bit ambitious. 

Like we've all bitten off a little bit more than we can chew. And it's one of those where either it's going to be fine. And like, we kind of hit it, we kind of don't, or if everything hits it, which I think we kind of did, it's going to be a really great show. Cody. Put a, he put a lot of himself into it. So I think he's, he's very excited to see that recognized and also just excited to get the award and be able to say like, cause we've been teasing him. 

It's like, yes, two time Tony nominee, Cody Spencer. And now it's just like, all right, Tony winner. So. Yeah, it's funny because he'll just, he'll kind of like duck his head and I don't know if I've ever actually seen him blush, but it's just like, if he could blush, he would be. And he, because like, all of the cast as they pass by does that, everybody does that. 

He's just like, ah, thanks, thanks. And it's just like, I know you're embarrassed, but you're also loving this a lot. So enjoy it. Have fun. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, no, it's super exciting for Cody. Cool, well I know we're coming around in time that you're going to turn into a pumpkin. Um, I 

Sean Walker: whole time. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, that's, although, oddly, a blue pumpkin, because Sean's camera's doing something weird, but 

Heather Augustine: those like Cinderella pumpkins. After a good night of sleep, you'll be back to normal. You'll be fine. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, um, I mean, is there anything, any other parting words, any advice, uh, like if you could go back and give one piece of advice to Penn State Heather. 

With what you know now, what would it be? 

Heather Augustine: The main piece of advice I give is like, don't be afraid to bother people. Where I love when people come up to me at the console and chat with me. I have, I have business cards that I had when I was on tour and maybe use like five or six of them. I will give them out like candy to like, if somebody comes up to me and says, Hey, like I'm doing this in high school, I'm doing this in college. 

It's like, email me. I love getting emails. I love when people, because I'll hand out business cards and maybe, like, one out of every ten actually emails me. And it's the like, no, no, no, I will talk about this for as long as anyone will let me, or as long as my schedule allows. But like, that's, that's the biggest thing where I was, I was a lot shyer. 

We've gotten over that, shockingly. Um, but like, I was a lot shyer when I was younger and wasn't really sure. What I was doing, but I wish I had just been like, Hi, I don't have the right questions. I don't necessarily know what's happening. Can you talk to me? Can you help me? And just go bother people. 

Bother me. Bother whoever you're seeing. Bother, like, go talk to the front of house engineer. If they're grumpy, they'll tell you to knock. It's like, and it's fine. But like, most of the time people are going to be happy to talk to people. So just ask. 

Sean Walker: You know, 

Andy Leviss: And if they are grumpy, don't take it personally, it's not 

Heather Augustine: yeah, it's probably just a bad day. 

Andy Leviss: Um, okay, well, so the one other last thing I'll ask before we let you go is, is there anything you wish you, or Sean or I, had been awake enough to ask you that we didn't? Score, 

Sean Walker: it. Yeah, 

Heather Augustine: I think we covered a lot of it. We hit, we hit career, we hit sound girls, we hit Tony Awards, all that fun stuff, tour. 

Sean Walker: Fast forward, we did it. 

Andy Leviss: we did it, Sean. 

Sean Walker: oh. Well, and, and 

Heather Augustine: 10 out of 10. Loved it. 

Sean Walker: got time to, 

Andy Leviss: Cool. Well, we'll, and, and we should, I don't know if you've got time to like hit the Discord up at all, but if you want, we'll send you a link and you're always welcome to like join in. I'm sure folks will have questions. I know there's every once in a while theater questions pop up, so I know folks would love to have you pop in there from time to time if, if you get the chance. 

Heather Augustine: absolutely. 

Andy Leviss: Cool. Well, thanks, thanks again for joining us, uh. 

Heather Augustine: me. This is fun. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, we'll say, you know, thanks to, thanks as always to, you know, uh, Allen and Heath and RCF for sponsoring and, uh, and, uh, keeping the virtual studio running for us here. Thanks to everybody else for listening. 

Sean Walker: mean, I think at this point, I'm sponsoring RCF. 

Andy Leviss: Yeah, we, we swear folks are like, are they paying Sean to talk about it so much? It's like, no, he just likes their stuff, man. Like, it just happened to work out well. 

Sean Walker: spent another 150 buying more PA from them last week, and so now we've got 48 boxes of HDL26 that just landed. The things are fucking incredible, dude. Just incredible. 

Andy Leviss: Love it. Love it. 

Sean Walker: So no, they're not paying me to talk about it. I'm paying them. 

Andy Leviss: Right on. Well, yeah, but, and we, we thank them for sponsoring it every week, you know. Thanks everybody for listening, and uh, we'll catch you on the next one. 

Sean Walker: Thanks y'all.

Music: “Break Free” by Mike Green