THENEWYORKER, SEPTEMBER 2, 2019 17
Me,” “I Love You Always Forever”) and
anti-love songs (“Love Hurts,” “Love
Is a Battlefield”). Then he printed out
all the lyrics and cut them up with scis-
sors. Certain songs got discarded, ei-
ther because they didn’t make sense
dramatically (Mariah Carey’s “Always
Be My Baby”), weren’t instantly recog-
nizable (“Stop,” by the Spice Girls), or
had rights issues (the Beatles allowed
them to say, but not sing, “All you need
is love”). When Luhrmann heard the
new version, there were some songs he
didn’t know, like Regina Spektor’s 2006
hit “Fidelity.” “I call it ‘Papagena,’ ” he
said, because it reminded him of “The
Magic Flute.”
In the studio, Luhrmann sat between
Levine and Matt Stine, the show’s music
producer, occasionally whispering to
both. Before Take 14, Levine gave the
actors some technical notes, asking
Olivo to push the “don’t” in No Doubt’s
“Don’t Speak,” and both to give more
breath support to David Bowie’s “He-
roes.” For the final flourish (“I Will Al-
ways Love You,” “Your Song”), he re-
minded them, “This is where we’re just
so unapologetically in love with love.
The song becomes a celebration. First
it’s an argument, then it’s a repartee,
then it gets a little sad, and then it’s a
big explosion. Right?”
They belted it out a few times, to a
recorded orchestral track. Luhrmann
looked half pleased. “They can obvi-
ously sing it, but they’re not playing in-
tentions strong enough,” he murmured
to Stine. He spoke into his mike: “Can
we play a silly little game? Do you think
you can just sing a cappella going into
the beginning? We’re not going to re-
cord it. Just play the actions. For fun.”
Tveit and Olivo acted out the medley
like a scene in drama class. Then Luhr-
mann told them, “Let’s go in, but don’t
let the orchestra dictate it for you. You
dictate it for the orchestra.” He added,
“Convince each other.”
Take 18. Drumroll. This time, there
was more zing in Tveit’s “Everlasting
Love,” extra snarl in Olivo’s “What’s
Love Got to Do With It.” By the time
they were duetting on “Up Where We
Belong,” it sounded as if they were sing-
ing the lines for the first time. Luhr-
mann smiled. “I, personally, think they
nailed it,” he said.
—Michael Schulman