Divorced. Beheaded. Died. Divorced. Beheaded. Survived.
The opening words of SIX share what many audience members already know: the grim fates of the half-dozen women successively wed to England's famously fickle 16th-century king, Henry VIII.
But what the pop-filled musical hopes to illuminate in the next 80 minutes are some of the true details — with plenty of humor and sassy, modern lingo — of each of their lives, overshadowed for far too long by the legacy of the lecherous and selfish man who, at a whim, cast off or killed all but one of them.
Opening on Broadway in 2020 for less than a month before the COVID shutdown, SIX's second national tour is next heading to Spokane for an eight-show run from Jan. 23 to 28 as part of the city's Best of Broadway series.
The show's stage setup is uncharacteristically simple — just the six lead queens and a four-person backing band — yet packs a dynamic, glitzy punch. Framed around a concert-style singing competition (inspired by the Queen Bey herself, Beyoncé), SIX pits the six queens against one another to decide who had the worst time with their shared husband.
Decked out in rhinestone and leather-embellished costumes with punk rock vibes and accessories — outfits that landed SIX one of its two Tony Awards — the women each take a turn at the mic with their song-delivered stories. Those energetic original songs by SIX's creators, British duo Lucy Moss and Toby Marlow, nabbed it a Tony Award in 2022, along with plenty more accolades.
Actress Kelly Denice Taylor has been part of the SIX cast since its Broadway debut. As an alternate for the current tour, she's prepared to fill in for three of the six different queens. Since learning and performing each of those roles she's found a personal connection to each woman she plays: Catherine of Aragon (first wife, divorced), Jane Seymour (third, died) and Anna of Cleves (fourth, divorced).
"I think we can all relate to a lot of the queens' story in different ways — minus the beheading and all the crazy things," Taylor says. "There's a persistence and resilience in Catherine of Aragon that I really, really relate to. And there's a soft side to Seymour that I kind of discovered on this tour because I'm used to playing bigger roles, and belting things out, and Seymour is more sweet, and she's subtle and she's like this calming force in the show."
"It's nice to know that I relate to one queen and that also I learned new things about myself," she continues. "And, you know, Anna of Cleves, she's just a party — really fun. And my personality really gets to shine in that role. So I'd say I relate to them all in different ways."
SIX's remaining queens are Anne Boleyn (second wife, beheaded), Katherine Howard (fifth wife, beheaded) and Catherine Parr (sixth wife, survived and outlived her husband).
As an alternate, Taylor needs to be ready to fill in when principal cast members become ill, injured or otherwise need a break.
"I'm one of four girls that they could call to go on at a moment's notice, and it can be anytime before the show," she says. "There've been times when I've gone on like 20 minutes before because something happened right before the show. So the nature of being an alternate is just being ready to go at all times, which I find pretty exciting."
Some nights, though, an alternate may step in if a principal cast member "swings out," a show biz term for sitting out a performance for any number of nonemergency reasons. During any performance she's not called in for, however, Taylor says she and the other alternates hang out backstage, working out or doing other tasks related to the show.
"I basically went through a rehearsal process to learn each queen individually, which took me about two and a half, almost three months," she says. "And then once you learn them, you debut in them, but it's pretty tricky because you're learning the harmonies for each queen, you're learning the choreography for each queen, and you're learning the entire show three different ways. So it can be pretty challenging, but really, really fun."
As SIX's second North American tour continues into 2024, Taylor is approaching her third year with the show. Though she started out on Broadway as an alternate for Jane Seymour, at one point she was actually splitting time as a substitute for two simultaneous North American tours, flying back and forth as needed.
Being a cast member of SIX is still a dream-come-true for Taylor, whose résumé includes voice work for Disney, plus international theme park and cruise performance contracts.
SIX focuses on diverse casting for the six queen roles, an element she says is essential for youth today who, like the musical-theater-loving teen she once was, may also have big dreams of becoming professional performers.
"I think the most beautiful thing is that we are giving these women a voice in modern times, because back in Tudor times, they didn't have a voice," Taylor says.
"So even though we tell it in a funny, modern way, we are giving these women a voice. We really home in on the idea that they are not just Henry's wives, but they also had lives, and they were real women and had real emotions. I think that's a great reminder for women today, when it comes to voting and activism and feminism. I think it's a really important message to remind women that they can use their voice." ♦
SIX • Jan. 23-27 at 7:30 pm, Jan. 27 at 2 pm, Jan. 28 at 1 and 6:30 pm • $52-$100 • First Interstate Center for the Arts • 334 W. Spokane Falls Blvd. • broadwayspokane.com
