THE GROUNDHOG DAY GROUPIE By Peter Filichia
That lyric from FOLLIES – “Thank-you-for-the-present-but-what’s-wrong-with-it-stuff?” – will never be heard in the home of Cheryl Solimini and Martin Farawell.
For Cheryl’s birthday in 2017, Martin bought two tickets to GROUNDHOG DAY: THE MUSICAL. Both had seen the original film and liked it. However, since 2009, they had been great fans of songwriter Tim Minchin’s Christmas song, “White Wine in the Sun.”
“Soon after,” Cheryl says, “we amassed all his musically comedic, comedically musical CDs, DVDs, downloads and interviews. This Aussie wanker makes us laugh and cry, often simultaneously and in tandem. So, when I learned that Tim Minchin was tackling a musical version of GROUNDHOG DAY, my heart exploded.”
Not as much, however, as it would in the years to come.
First, though, came Sunday, May 28, 2017, when star Andy Karl was indisposed. “Martin was afraid I’d be disappointed that the understudy was performing. But Andrew Call was terrific and will always be part of the initial joy.”
Cheryl had anticipated that Minchin’s Tony-nominated score would be “funny and charming and clever and naughty,” but “what I didn’t expect was I’d start tearing up within the first five minutes. And, yes, laughing. Within five minutes of Act Two, I was sobbing and, yes, laughing again.
“What I love is how Tim used the different musical genres to underscore Phil’s emotions,” she says, speaking about the show’s cynical weatherman who only finds his humanity after living the same day over and over.
“Particularly his perceptions of the world he’s stuck in, from the deliberately cacophonous musical-theater style ‘Day One’ that sets Phil’s teeth on edge to the grinding grunge-rock ‘Hope,’ which is about not giving up on suicide: ‘I’m a lot of things/but I’m not a quitter!’”
Cheryl also admits that she’s “a sucker for wordplay and rhyme-within-rhyme” and loves that “‘Nobody Cares’ goes all out: ‘I sometimes try to clean the mess I make from my mistakes/but for whose sake am I making all this effing effort for?’ – all to a foot-stomping country beat.”
The emotional songs register, too. “I can’t get through ‘Night Will Come’ without losing it,” she admits. “It’s death personified, beautifully, and how we think we can hold it off by distracting ourselves: ‘All the steel, all the bricks/All the math and magic tricks/All the carrots, all the sticks/You won’t evade her.’ Still, ‘You gotta love life.’”
“But what gets to me most is ‘Seeing You,’ the final song that’s the simplest and most sincere. ‘I thought the only way to better days was through tomorrow,’ Phil finally admits. ‘But I know now that I know nothing.’ No more wordplay, just stripped down to accepting that this is his life, and these are the people he’ll be spending it with: ‘But I’m here and I’m fine/and I’m seeing you/for the first time.’”
Because she adored the musical, seeing Andy Karl was a must. The very next day, the couple purchased tickets. Karl did not disappoint. “I’m generally not compelled to meet celebrities or get autographs,” Cheryl insists, “but I got his while singing to him, ‘I’m seeing you/for the first time.’ He joined in!”
Attending twice was an anomaly, for Cheryl and Martin usually see only one Broadway show annually, what with “ticket prices more costly than dental work,” she (understandably) groans. “For weeks, I kept entering the lottery – never winning – but finally getting an offer for reduced price tickets, which we jumped on.” Hence, the third trip to the August Wilson Theatre.
Some weeks later, Cheryl’s mother had a major health issue. “While I took care of her throughout the last half of 2017, I played the cast album incessantly to get me through. Every day the opening song ran through my head: ‘Oh, if I could, I’d will these clouds away, my love/I’d wave my hand, reveal the stars/Oh, if I could, I hold the tide at bay, my love/But clouds will come and tides will turn/And all I have to offer is… tomorrow.’”
“Then came September 17, 2017,” she says, citing her own day which will live in infamy: GROUNDHOG DAY closed. “At least part of my attachment was feeling that it hadn’t gotten the love or awards it deserved,” she explains. “When a proposed tour was cancelled, I thought I’d never see it performed anywhere ever again.”
Hardly. In February 2020, when visiting Cheryl’s mother in Florida, GROUNDHOG DAY was playing Fort Lauderdale’s Slow Burn Theatre. “A month later, the pandemic hit, and I thought, ‘That’s it! I’ll again never see it again!’” says Cheryl.
But in February 2023, Google turned up a community theater production in Stamford, CT. No matter that they’d drive hours to get from their home in the Poconos. “It was on a tiny platform, but the production was stellar with an enthusiastic cast,” Cheryl says.
Nice that the couple doesn’t feel “If it isn’t Broadway, it’s beneath us.” Says Cheryl, “I can’t wait to see a high school production and if a kindergarten takes it on anywhere in the world, I’m there. It should be required for theater departments in every school system. Because, kids, it’s never too early to learn that you gotta love life. Yes, it has its challenges, but the only thing you can control is your reaction to them. Even the most annoying person who comes into your life has something to teach you or for you to teach them.”
Cheryl’s “Anywhere in the world” may sound hyperbolic, but subsequent events show that she isn’t necessarily exaggerating.
“We also learned the Old Vic in London, where the show originated in 2016, was reviving it with Andy,” Cheryl recalls. “It was around the time of my birthday and just before our 40th wedding anniversary.”
Off they went. True, the production wasn’t as elaborate as the Broadway iteration. “No turntable!” Cheryl mourns. “But the show still connected.”
And Cheryl made a bigger connection than she’d ever expected. “Just before the lights went down, we saw someone, grasping a notebook, slip into an aisle seat. Yes, it was Tim Minchin! We were both mouthing the words to ‘Stuck’ during the first act.
“In the lobby during intermission, I hoped for a glimpse. Then I overheard someone say that Matthew Warchus, the Old Vic’s artistic director, was there, and they wanted to talk to him. So, I followed them, waiting discreetly.
“But when the theater lights flashed,” she says, “I interrupted to thank Matthew, say why the show meant so much to me and asked him to thank Tim. He replied, ‘You can thank him yourself. Here he is!’ And there Tim was, at my elbow! He seemed delighted that I live in Pennsylvania (home of Punxsutawney) and gave me a hug. I was in a state of existential shock throughout the second act.”
Perhaps that’s why, when Martin suggested that she take a picture with Minchin, she declined – “It’s enough that I know this happened” – but she then approached Minchin and said, “My husband thinks I should get a picture with you.’ He said, ‘I wondered why you didn’t ask the first time.’ I’ve since learned that he is equally adorable with everyone.”
They stagedoored to see Karl, who, of course, was stunned that the couple had traveled such a distance. And yet, a substantially bigger trip was in store when Minchin’s Facebook page announced that GROUNDHOG DAY would premiere in Melbourne in 2024.
“We booked one show, and once we were there, we grabbed reduced-price seats for an earlier night,” Cheryl adds triumphantly before grieving that she couldn’t get to even one of the three Japanese cities where the musical played last November.
Karl did Melbourne, too, so they again stagedoored. “He said, ‘I knew you looked familiar!’ and we chatted. I suggested he do the show in various places that I wanted to visit, starting with Venice. He was up for it.”
Lest we assume that her hubby is dragged to a show that he has, to say the least, seen many times, Cheryl assures us otherwise. “Martin has been a big Tim Minchin fan as long as I have and is even more apt to check his social media. He says that his appreciation for the show has deepened as he experiences each performance with me. Which is why we’re still married.”
So, are you surprised to learn that Cheryl and Martin celebrated this actual Groundhog Day by traveling to Woodstock, Illinois (where the movie was actually was filmed) and – more to the point – seeing a production there?
“But my fantasy is that Broadway comes to its senses and brings GROUNDHOG DAY back so I can take all of my nieces and nephews. My dream also requires Andy to play Phil, even if he must use a walker. Hell, he performed with a torn ACL; age won’t slow him down.”
She takes a breath. “I have never devoted myself to anything as much as this, beyond friends and family – and food,” she concedes. Thus, she feels qualified to make this offer to future productions: “If someone in the cast is suddenly struck down by food poisoning, I’m ready to step in.”
Well, if COMPANY can change Bobby to Bobbi, GROUNDHOG DAY can switch Phil to Phillippa. Producers, Cheryl Solimini will be ready… day after day after day after day…
Peter Filichia can be heard most weeks of the year on www.broadwayradio.com. His calendar – A SHOW TUNE FOR TODAY: 366 Songs to Brighten Your Year – is now available on Amazon.
