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It’s a Broadway tradition that should someone break into one of it’s theatres to perform, they would get their fifteen minutes of fame, literally. It was a tradition, one that gave the future generations a taste of their dreams, and gave the directors a taste of the future of the show business. Therefore, when Joe Mantello was notified that a couple of teens had broken in the Gershwin Theatre the same week of the Show Choir Nationals, he was there, hoping to see a future Elphaba or Galinda and their Fiyero.
What he saw, though, changed his life forever.
The couple was indeed singing a duet, but there wasn’t a Fiyero in sight. Who was there was Elphaba, strong and emotional and oh so live-like, much like Idina's – and God, how he missed his little Elphie-, and besides her, singing his heart out was Glinda. And he may not have believed in genderbent characters before, but now, seeing the chemistry between them, and the way the scene lived through them, he saw it for the first time:
The girl, older, with green skin and dressed all in black, pouring strength in every note and in every movement, giving life to the Wicked Witch of the West. And the boy, now a man, dressed in a perfectly blue suit with eyes shining with raw emotion, and showing the whole world that yes he could do this, giving the song a depth no one knew it lacked. The orchestra would play, complimenting their voices, but never masking them, drawing chills from the audience, making the magic stronger. And the audience, a full house of skeptics who didn’t know what he knew, who didn’t know that the story could be this way, who didn't believe Glinda could be this way. Joe saw their minds change as the song, no, as the play progressed. And as the last notes died, it was so clear to him, how the crowd would give a standing ovation, how these two teens would smile and bow, and adrenaline would be high on every vein of every person in the theatre that night. In three minutes, Joe Mantello saw how the world would change, and by God, he needed to be a part of that.
That afternoon, he went to the Show Choir Nationals for the first time in years, where he learnt his future stars names: Rachel Berry and Kurt Hummel. And just you wait Broadway, he thought as he watched them give the world a taste of their own brand of magic, you’re going to learn these names soon enough.