When Will Brill received residence after profitable his first Tony award, he was a little bit, effectively….spooked. “I used to be in mattress and any person texted me like, ‘How are you feeling?’” Brill remembers. “And I used to be immediately hit with like, There’s a Tony on this home. It could possibly’t be seen. It’s lurking! So bizarre.”
Per week after profitable finest featured actor in a play for his efficiency in Stereophonic, Brill admits it nonetheless “feels a little bit bizarre.” His portrayal of Reg – the hilarious, endearing, and sometimes frighteningly coke-and-booze-addled bass participant in Stereophonic’s fictional Nineteen Seventies rock band on the verge of mega stardom – made Brill the one solid member from the most-Tony-nominated-ever play to convey residence {hardware}. However on Tony evening, Brill made certain to present his full solid its due: in his delightfully off-the-cuff acceptance speech, he requested all his castmates to face up for an ovation (he additionally, memorably, thanked his therapist).
Like his fellow Stereophonic solid members, Brill wasn’t an skilled, educated musician earlier than becoming a member of the ensemble. However buying the ability to convincingly play one onstage (and carry out the play’s Tony-nominated rating by Will Butler there) was the sort of deep-dive expertise Brill has lengthy relished as an actor: His wide-ranging roles have included Dr. Astrov, within the hyper-intimate off-Broadway manufacturing of Uncle Vanya that came about in a personal New York loft final 12 months, in addition to Roy Cohn in Showtime’s miniseries Fellow Vacationers, and the peddler Ali Hakim within the 2019 Broadway reimagining of Oklahoma!.
As Stereophonic continues its run on Broadway by Jan. 5, 2025, Brill spoke to Billboard about including Reg to that checklist, in addition to about his action-packed Tony evening.
Have you ever began to return to phrases with cohabitating together with your Tony?
Kind of… I imply, folks maintain like asking, “The place are you going to place it?” I don’t know…. wherever it…appears good? Wherever it suits? Like, I needed to put my bike on this one nook as a result of that’s the place it match. I don’t have a whole lot of artwork in my home, and now I’ve this factor I’m like, obligated to show.
You must put it someplace sudden, like the lavatory.
Completely. My thought, which I imagine is a step too far, was to place it in the bathroom. So it’s actually a shock to anyone who’s utilizing the lavatory. I’ve a buddy who retains his within the fridge. And I heard that Ian McKellen retains his many awards on his roof in order that they will “relaxation.” I don’t know what which means, however that’s allegedly what he does.
Earlier than we focus on anything, I want the story of your ensemble for Tonys evening: the pleats, the jewellery… it was a glance!
I used to be working with a stylist, Savannah White, and we had bounced round a whole lot of concepts of shops and designers and we had been largely on the identical web page: Vivienne Westwood, Thom Browne, Commes des Garcons, and Issey Miyake, who I didn’t actually know of till he handed. I simply noticed an article about him and began Googling him and was actually moved by his aesthetic.
So then Savannah got here again with the 2 appears [of Miyake’s] that I wound up sporting. I used to be like, “Oh my God, that is so in contrast to something I’ve seen, and I’ve to think about it’s going to be completely in contrast to what anyone else goes to be sporting.” I wished to be sporting one thing that wasn’t following a gender binary, and I really feel like Issey’s stuff hangs on any human physique fantastically. I felt actually fortunate that we type of nailed it. All the pieces was type of flowy and peculiar and off-kilter — and few straight traces apart from the pleats themselves. It was actually a enjoyable match.
Will Brill accepts the Greatest Efficiency by an Actor in a Featured Function in a Play award for Stereophonic onstage throughout The 77th Annual Tony Awards at David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Middle on June 16, 2024 in New York Metropolis.
Theo Wargo/Getty Pictures
Your speech was iconic, to say the least. Whenever you thanked your therapist, it grew to become one of many most-memed moments of the evening. How did you hear about that?
My PR particular person got here as much as me and was like, “The web liked your speech.” And I used to be like, “Oh, that’s so good. I simply assumed that it was like, both the web loves your speech or hates your speech — I had no concept that me shouting out my therapist was going to be any sort of an enormous deal or that shouting out the remainder of my solid, for that matter, was going to be an enormous deal too. However they each type of confirmed up in every single place. I received a very candy textual content from my therapist that in the first place was all caps, “HOLY S–T, YOU WON! F–Okay YEAH!” After which, two minutes later, “Oh my God Will, that is so candy,” which actually made me completely satisfied.
You additionally gave a shoutout to your bass trainer. What was the method of studying the instrument like for you? You actually get the physicality and persona of a bass participant down, in addition to the technical facets, which appears uniquely difficult.
It was actually vital for me to look genuine. I had expertise studying an instrument for a [project] earlier than — I realized to play 12 songs on the guitar for this David Chase movie Not Fade Away, and that’s really the place I met Robbie Mangano, who was in The Grandmothers of Invention and is an astonishing guitar and bass participant. He taught me and Jack Huston play guitar for the film.
Nevertheless it was a special factor; we actually simply wanted to appear like we had been enjoying the songs, which had been pre-recorded by basically the E Avenue Band. We didn’t really should play for sound, we simply needed to appear like we knew what we had been doing, and there have been all kinds of how to chop round the truth that we didn’t know what we had been doing.
So for this present, I referred to as Robbie to assist me be taught the bass. However Robbie was additionally weirdly on the intersection of my life the place I began to consider sobriety, which is like one other enormous a part of Reg. I received actually drunk at a present of Robbie’s, and he wrote me this two-page letter, the place he was like, “I’ve seen too many proficient folks not have the life that they need to as a result of they received caught up with medication and alcohol, and I actually imagine in you and I depend you as a pal and I hope that that may not be one thing that occurred to you.”
On the time I couldn’t hear it, and I really wound up not speaking to him for a number of years as a result of I used to be so embarrassed. Years and years later, I received a divorce after which I received sober after which [Stereophonic] got here again round. So by the point I referred to as Robbie to start out studying the bass once more, I used to be two years sober and received to inform him that he was an enormous a part of that. And he wound up saying to me, “Wow, that’s loopy. I’m just lately sober too.” It was actually loopy and transferring. So he’s been a really particular touchstone in my life.
Nice bass gamers particularly appear to have this innate consolation in your personal pores and skin. Was that pure so that you can obtain or extra of a journey?
It was a journey, for certain. However what was cool was, once I was a little bit child, I assumed I used to be going to be a magician. I’d follow card tips alone in my room for actually 12 hours a day. I didn’t pursue magic as a result of it was too scary to carry out in entrance of individuals these items that required unbelievable dexterity. However once I began studying the bass, it triggered this lengthy dormant a part of my mind, which was like the enjoyment of doing one thing dexterous 1000 instances alone in your bed room and dropping sleep over it and making an attempt to excellent this one factor and getting nearer and nearer. So I actually felt like I used to be practising magic once more.
You and your castmates opened for Will Butler at his personal precise album launch present only a few weeks after previews for Stereophonic began. What was that like?
It was insane. Lots of people took movies with their telephones and despatched them to me afterward, and I used to be so embarrassed at how stiff and horrible I used to be that I used to be like, “Okay, you don’t should simply get good on the bass, you need to look wonderful, you might have to have the ability to dance and play the bass on the similar time.” It nonetheless by no means feels prefer it’s straightforward, however it’s cool to have audiences come now and say that it appears prefer it’s straightforward, as a result of that’s type of the aim.
From left: Tom Pecinka, Will Brill and Sarah Pidgeon in Stereophonic.
Julieta Cervantes
Had been there specific bass gamers who had been fashions to your portrayal of Reg?
I undoubtedly watched movies of John McVie enjoying. Will Butler is the one frontman I can consider off the highest of my head who additionally performs bass, and he’s so dance-y in his reveals — he’s so free, he’s a real wild man on stage, and he was actually an enormous supply of inspiration.
I went to see Muna just lately, and the band that opened for them [Nova Twins], it was these two British ladies enjoying sort of hardcore music and dressed up type of like punk-style Raggedy Ann. The bassist would leap round and run across the stage, and I keep in mind considering like, “I need to get near that and I need to have that freedom of motion.” Apart from that, studying the instrument was so laborious and studying the play was so laborious that there was not likely a whole lot of room exterior your creativeness to do further analysis.
This looks like such a lightning in a bottle sort of expertise for all of you. Has it in any elementary methods modified what you need from the work you do going ahead?
Yeah, for certain — however I feel each function I play, to a sure extent, is a reassessment of what I need to do going ahead. The final word factor that I like about performing and exploring characters is exploring the totally different the degrees of myself that I don’t know fully or perceive and by extrapolation exploring the human situation increasingly deeply.
I used to be simply speaking about this in remedy as we speak, really. Like, I’m always straddling a line: Am I doing justice to myself and the function that I’m enjoying by placing in an quantity of effort that truly does significant excavation for myself and for the folks coming? Or ought to I be resting a little bit bit extra, and might the method be simpler and extra joyful?
I’d say the peddler in Oklahoma! was a extra joyful than troublesome expertise for me; in all probability A Case For The Existence of God was too and possibly Fellow Vacationers was a little bit extra joyful than it was troublesome. After which Uncle Vanya and this have each actually ridden on the cusp of pleasure and problem. They’ve been essentially the most difficult experiences of my life, but additionally deeply, deeply gratifying.