Episode published: Tuesday 01/27/2026
Michael: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another new episode of Every Day is Groundhog Day (Except for the Days When It's Not), the only podcast devoted to the holiday, Groundhog Day. I'm your host, Michael, the owner of Countdown to Groundhog Day. Hope you enjoyed our last episode with returning guest, Edwin Everhart, about his Groundhog Day mini-album, Here Comes the Groundhog. Groundhog Day is rapidly approaching, and we've got less than a week left until the big day! Today, I've got none other than the actor who originated the role of Phil Connors in the Groundhog Day musical, Andy Karl. Andy has played Phil Connors a lot, appearing in the musical at The Old Vic in London in 2016, on Broadway in 2017, at The Old Vic again in 2023, and in Australia in 2024. Besides playing Phil, Andy has an extensive resume, appearing in shows like Moulin Rouge! the Musical, Into the Woods, Wicked, 9 to 5, and so much more. Listen to the interview to find out all about Andy, what it was like playing such an iconic role, and more. Enjoy!
Michael: So, today I'm speaking with Andy Karl. Andy is an actor who has seemingly appeared in every major Broadway musical in the past several decades, including, but not limited to, Legally Blonde, Jersey Boys, Rocky the Musical, Pretty Woman: The Musical, Into the Woods, and of course, the reason we're speaking on this Groundhog Day-themed podcast today, he originated the role of Phil Connors in the Groundhog Day musical. So, welcome, Andy. Thanks so much for taking the time to speak with me today.
Andy Karl: Thank you! I've done this musical four different times between 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2025, and we haven't spoken yet. This is highly upsetting to me. I'm so glad we're actually doing this today, and so close to Groundhog Day.
Michael: I'm so glad as well. You have probably spent how many more times playing Phil Connors than the other person who we know, who has played Phil Connors? How many hours? How many times?
Andy Karl: Oh, gosh. Well, it's really interesting how Groundhog Day, the theme of repetition and the days happening over and over and over again, is just the reflection of my life with that show because I've played it over and over and over again. One of the things that I think Danny Rubin, who wrote the original screenplay and the book for the musical, we had discussed bits, you know, and pieces of how long Phil Connors is in that town, and you kinda have to match it up to how long did it take him to learn piano the way. So, it's usually about 10,000 hours per, like, instrument, or whatever else he's learning along the way, poetry, things like that. So, you just sort of calculate that as much as possible. But I've never actually done a full count of how many times I've done it, nor has the actual character lived that day. It's more of a metaphysical piece. You live the day over and over again until it teaches you the lessons.
Michael: So, can we start with a little bit of your background? Have you always wanted to be an actor? Have you always wanted to be in musicals specifically? What led you into this profession in the first place?
Andy Karl: Right now, ironically, I'm sitting in my mother's basement in Baltimore. I have been visiting here, and this is kind of where I found my love for music, was in this basement. She had the piano down here, and she had a giant record collection of every, I don't know, from classical music, then my brother had a lot of, like, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin, and my dad had some Beatles. And then, you know, in betwixt some of that stuff, my mother had a collection of musicals: West Side Story, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Who's Tommy? I think when I heard those, and I heard these stories, and I saw these movies of these, I sort of gained my first interest in that. But I didn't know I wanted to be an actor until I got my first laugh on a stage in high school, at Towson High School here in Baltimore, and that's kind of where it sparked from. I was playing General Bullmoose in Li'l Abner with a big old mustache and white in my hair. I did some line and a gesture, and I dropped my hands, and the crowd laughed, and I was like, 'Oh! I love this. For the rest of my life, I'm going to be chasing this same dragon.' And I literally am, still to this day.
Michael: Great. So, what other plays did you do?
Andy Karl: Oh, so many. High school was Li'l Abner, but then I realized what I wanted to do, and I immediately started... I think my mother suggested I audition for a children's show in White Marsh Dinner Theater. I played all the dinner theaters in Baltimore. I don't think any of them are open anymore, but every three months, they would have a new musical. So, I auditioned, and I got my first role playing in a kids' show. And then, I moved up to the adult shows, and I just became part of this dinner theater, community theater community here in Baltimore. And then, I just gave it a shot when I was, I don't know, like 20, went to New York, and said, I'm going to go up there with a couple bucks that I made over the summer at 7-Eleven and the local pool, and just started auditioning. I was pretty terrible, but I got into some ensembles; they just needed people who could sing in the background. I wasn't a good dancer, and I didn't really have that much acting experience just from doing shows, but I think I knew my way around a stage and all that kind of stuff. I wasn't a good dancer. But as I started doing it, I started learning, I started watching, and I started taking more classes, and I've grown into the musical theater artist that you see before you. So many profound experiences along the way to get me where I am, but that's kind of the short version journey of that.
Michael: I saw you had done some work at Paper Mill Playhouse.
Andy Karl: The Paper Mill, I did two shows there, great place. I had a good relationship with them, and I actually tried to get them to produce a show that I've been working on, Scoonge: A Mobbed Up Christmas Carol, that I wrote with my friend Dominic Scaglione Jr., he's taken classes at Paper Mill, he's from that area. We were trying to pitch this show. It's a Christmas show, but it was a little too dirty for them. They need the G-rated Christmas shows at Paper Mill Playhouse because they have a lot of families coming to see shows. But we're still looking for a place for [New York mobster accent] Scoonge: A Mobbed Up Christmas Carol.
Michael: So, when was this written? This was written more recently?
Andy Karl: When did we write it? We wrote it 2022. We wrote it during the pandemic, and there's just a little bit of a story there. My friend was writing this, and he showed it to me- Or no, I did a reading of one of the characters over Zoom during the pandemic with a bunch of our friends that we had worked with, and I was like, 'Oh, I get it. Give me a week with this script. I know exactly what to do with it.' So, he and I went back and forth, and I had restructured a lot of the stuff. I had some writing courses under my belt, and that kind of stuff. And I was like, there's something here that's not been done before, this is so hilarious, it's so fun. So, over the pandemic, we wrote this, we did another reading of it, it was really great. Then we actually put it up at the Birdland Theater in New York one Christmas, and it sold out; it was super funny. We have something that we really want to keep doing. Groundhog Day, the musical is very much- Or Groundhog Day, the actual movie and musical, is very much sort of a spin on A Christmas Carol, which I felt like I have a connection in a lot of ways to growth of character and all these kinds of things. We did it, and it's so hilarious, and we're still looking for places to do it around Christmastime. We've done it a couple of times since then, but yeah, it's got all the basic characters, but with an Italian mob spin on it, like Ebenezer Scunjarelli, and Tiny Tony, and Bob Cratchitore. It was truly, truly super fun! It brought me back to loving Christmas a lot, because when we were doing those readings over Zoom, it brought me back to a community of friends that I adore, and I can laugh with, and I can celebrate Christmas in that way. So yeah, that's my special connection back into really celebrating Christmas since COVID.
Michael: Okay, great. I mean, I hope you can find more places to do that. If they did it at the Paper Mill Playhouse, I'd be able to go check it out, but I guess that's a no-go.
Andy Karl: I think it would kill. It would kill. I think they're missing out on something, but they were very nice enough to sit in and watch a reading. I thought they just thought it was like... You know, people need to have a drink in their hand when they're watching this show. And I was like, I agree.
Michael: I mean, I brought it up in the first place because that's, like... I definitely went there on maybe one or two field trips, because it's maybe an hour away from here. I don't even remember what we saw, but you know, I probably didn't appreciate it as an 11-year-old or whatever. I'd probably appreciate it more, much more now to go down there.
Andy Karl: Yeah, I think it's a great theater. I did Grease there, and I did Romeo and Bernadette, which was like a Romeo and Juliet with an Italian mob spin. There's a real something here. I played a lot of Italians.
Michael: I guess, I guess there is a theme.
Andy Karl: They both were really successful and really fun and just a great theater to work at.
Michael: All right. So, I guess let's get to Groundhog Day. Originally premiered at The Old Vic in 2016, and moved to Broadway the following year. How did you get the role? Is it something you had to audition for? Were you always going for the Phil role, or, you know, were there other things you might have been interested in, in the show?
Andy Karl: Yeah, great question. Thinking back on it.. Matthew Warchus, who was the director and he was the artistic director at The Old Vic Theatre in London, he and Tim Minchin and Danny Rubin had worked on Groundhog Day. They had done some workshops of it before that in London with other people. I think Matthew Warchus had come to see some shows on Broadway, and had seen me do a show, On the Twentieth Century, and he'd also seen me, I think, do Rocky, so he knew I had the, sort of like, physicality, and I could also be a clown and very funny, but also I could be very serious. He saw something in that. So, he actually reached out to my agents and asked me, you know, would I consider auditioning for it? But he wanted to talk to me about it. And I was like, oh, that's very exciting. Every actor, especially like, you know, Matthew Warchus is a tremendous actor and very well-renowned, and The Old Vic Theatre is very well-renowned. So, I was just sort of agog that I was going to go see this guy, but I was trying to play it cool. So, we met somewhere, they had a meeting room in one of these hotels, and we just like sort of talked about it a little bit, where I wanted to know what his concept was. Like, that's amazing, that seems like such an interesting concept. How are you going to do it? And he's like, 'Well, let me play you this opening number to Groundhog Day.' And it's 'One Day,' which is- 'Day One.' Sorry, 'One Day' is different. Day One' is the first song after the sort of overture piece. And it kind of takes, it follows Phil through this day talking to all these people in Punxsutawney and running into people, and sort of he's sort of being curmudgeony and sardonic to people, and, you know, he's just sick of being there. This is his fourth time covering the Groundhog Day festivities, and he's like, 'Get me out of here as quickly as possible. I don't want to deal with these people.' And it was very funny, and it went through all these themes and, you know, very Tim Minchin kind of brain spectrum of what musicality is. He's so wild and outlandish, and also very funny, and such a musician. It was just like, after he played the demo for me, I was like, 'Well, that's [bleep] amazing.' That just came out of my mouth. I apologize for my language, but that was the words that I literally used. I was sort of stunned. But I also thought Phil Connors, played by Bill Murray, is a legendary role and a legendary actor-comedian, and I was scared. I was like, I don't think I'm the guy. But I didn't kind of say that. I was like, you know, I think like, Norbert Leo Butz would be really great at this. I actually said that to him in the meeting. And he's like, 'Well, take the script.' So, I read the script, and I read what it was doing, and I read into the idea of, like, this repetition and the profoundness of what it does in order to, I don't know, elevate this character from point A to point B; to go from somebody who's so curmudgeony to someone who's so selfless and open to the world, that I was like, 'Oh, wow! This is an epic journey of a part,' and I was like, 'I have to do it.' I was doing Law and Order at the time, which was great, I was on a season of Law and Order, and I took one of the days off to go and audition for Matthew. He was on a computer screen in from London, and there was a couple producers there, and I just auditioned my butt off. It's more about finding what Phil has to learn; he has to be such a jerk, but he also has to really kind of be a worldly, wise person at the end. And I think they had the two scenes that are really contradictory to each other, and I nailed it. So, that's kind of how I got the part. I was still scared, but I was also extremely excited because playing repetition on stage is a problem-solving thing. I like problem-solving. But also, what am I going to be able to tap into with this character? Those of us that know the movie so well, and me personally, knowing the source material and the musical so well, know that it's a deeper, deeper journey into who we are as human beings. So, it's a show that I was so looking forward to, and one that's changed my life subsequently since then.
Michael: Okay, so you didn't have to go out to London for the audition? You said Matthew was on the computer.
Andy Karl: No, he piped in from a computer. Yeah, that was good enough. But, yeah, they flew me out to London, I guess, like, a couple months later, and I was like, 'Okay, here we go.' Had a great time in London, been there twice with the show, actually. So, that was something about the London experience, the experience, and also the time we had to rehearse was just such a great experience, such a collaborative experience. And Matthew Warchus, the director, he can tell you one sentence that'll make your brain open, and you're like, 'Okay, yes, I get it.' Tim was furiously writing little bits and pieces. And, you know, Danny Rubin was throwing in a few jokes here and there that, you know, I was like, 'Can we try this? Can we put this from the movie back in? This line in the movie is so funny. It's going to kill. And I know it's going to kill.'
Michael: That was something I was going to ask. Since you were originating the role, there was some sort of... You had some input into what we ultimately see. Like, you could make suggestions and get the...
Andy Karl: Yeah. I think it was really pretty well written at the time. But the fact that I had a certain amount of physicality, I had a certain adventurous spirit about doing things, I had certain bits that I could turn that would be really funny, that are built into the show that were, like, just things I discovered along the way and added in there, and things that worked really well just and may and worked for the piece. So, I was constantly offering, I was so excited, I was constantly offering something, I offered stuff, and they would turn some things down, of course, but some things they just were like, 'Yeah, give it a shot!' And yeah, it really just sort of became built on me, which was very nice to be a part of something like that. Obviously, Bill Murray was always in my mind, like, you know, how did he do this bit? How did he play this? What would he find funny? And then eventually, it turned into, I started taking bits and pieces from other actors that I had seen, and then I started putting together, sort of, my Phil Connors, which is great because the musical celebrates the source material, but it's different. It's different in a lot of ways of playing live theater, and it's different in a way of, like, obviously, we're singing, but it also sort of like, I believe it reaches a little bit further into the profound idea of what Groundhog Day and repetition and being a human being means. I get so meta about it. I could go on and on about, you know, what it means to me, but I also know that it celebrates this great holiday, Groundhog Day, which I think is just the smartest idea that Danny Rubin had to sort of center it around this holiday, because it is such a celebratory thing. I think when we first started rehearsal, Matthew Warchus showed just one Groundhog Day where they lift up Phil, and they actually showed the footage from the actual event. In London, people look at this like, 'What? What's wrong with Americans? It's weird.' [Michael chuckles] And I was like, no, this is a thing. This is actually done every year. But it was just funny that he wanted, he really wanted to get us into like, what are we really looking at? And people actually celebrate this, and they do it in a funny way, and they talk to the groundhog. You know, it's beautiful, funny, silly, and celebratory, and a great way for people to get together on a very cold day.
Michael: Yeah. I mean, it's something I tend to forget sometimes that it's a very North American-centered holiday, and it's maybe not as obvious to the rest of the world what exactly is going on there. When I talked to Danny Rubin last year, he mentioned that that was one of the changes they had to make when they were doing the Tokyo show. He was like, 'We actually had to add some lines, like actually explaining what exactly a groundhog is.' You know, he's like, they needed some extra stuff in there to...
Andy Karl: Yeah, to give context. But then again, you look at a lot of people, a lot of like Tokyo animals and cartoons, you're like, 'What is this thing?' But I guess, you know, everybody needs an explanation.
Michael: I mean, they could just switch in another animal, too. That is possible.
Andy Karl: Yeah, a little Hello Kitty instead of Phil.
Michael: Exactly. So, when you did the first run in London at The Old Vic, that was what? Like, four weeks, I think I saw somewhere.
Andy Karl: The actual run? I remember six weeks of rehearsals, a very long rehearsal period, because we had five revolves on the floor. So, you know, in like, Les Misérables, people see the sort of barricade turning, that's one revolve. That's one revolve. We had five of them on the stage. Matthew Warchus wanted to create a time... sort of a clock on stage, in a way, where time sort of reversed and went forward, and some pieces went forward, while others went backwards. This is all while we're running across stage. So, everything was mapped out and timed out to within an inch of its life. You know, luckily, there was a lot of ankles that survived. My knee didn't survive Broadway, but that's a whole other story. So, yeah. But the actual run in London, how long was that? It must have been a little longer than four weeks. I just remember it being a really glorious time. It was so nice to work in London. That was my first time working there.
Michael: Was there an awareness, like, or the possibility of going to Broadway at that point? Or is it, kind of, focus on The Old Vic first and then...? Yeah, I think certain shows will set themselves up to be like, okay, we're doing this out-of-town run, and basically, we have a plan to go to Broadway. So, they have producers that end up getting on it, and when they actually do the production, and they have people come to the first few weeks, some investors, then they're like, 'Yep, we're going to go.' There was a plan. So, the plan was to do The Old Vic and then go to Broadway. However, if it was terrible at The Old Vic and people hated it, then they could be like, 'No, they're not going to go.' But there was a plan. Luckily, it broke box office records, it got tremendous reviews, Olivier Awards, so we were, like, straight to Broadway, let's go. Yeah, that was really nice to know that when you're doing a show, you're like, [tone of relief] 'Oh, this is fantastic.' Yeah, we're going to go. And this, I go back to sort of my hometown in a way, and I get to prove something to the people that I've been working with, like, now I'm going to be this lead character that's pretty complex and funny, and I'm really looking forward to it. I was so happy to bring it here also because Groundhog Day is a North American holiday. Something about... It felt like we were bringing it back home, and that felt good to me. So it was, yeah, I was pretty excited all the way around. Yeah. So, and I mentioned to Danny last year, unfortunately, I wasn't able to see the musical when it was on Broadway.
Andy Karl: Very short run. [laughs]
Michael: Yeah, exactly! My kids were pretty young at that point, and I was like, 'It's going to be there a while, I'll have time.' And then, all of a sudden, it was out of there. And I was like, I really should have made an effort because New York is going to be the easiest thing for me to see.
Andy Karl: Well, I mean, I know there's probably some YouTubes of it out there in the world you could probably catch. I'll tell you, it's interesting because I guess my journey with the show, because I've done it many times, I've done four different incarnations of it in different countries. I've always kind of like, gone into it with like, 'What's my intention as a person? Why do I want to do this? Why am I going to do it again? What's the next... Why am I entering into this?' Because I'd rather have a purpose to go into something so that I can really feel like, you know, have a reason for doing it. The first time doing it, The Old Vic was obviously to, like, prove something to myself, and prove something that I could hold a show on my shoulders, and I could really bring something to it. I was sort of just interested in testing everything that I could do. So, I was very collaborative, I was very much on my feet and on my toes. Taking it to Broadway was, okay, I have something to prove to this town. I've been doing a bunch of shows. I'm now on this lead that's in a brand-new show. I've only done one lead before with Rocky, and that was sort of a short run as well. It was a very interesting piece. I wanted to show a bit of myself, and I wanted... I have something to prove to this town and to the people that I've worked with, who I adore and I respect. I kind of wanted the respect out of that. Later on, maybe as we talk about the next incarnations of those, I'll give you the reasons behind those. But I realized after the Broadway run, where two things happened. I got a bad knee injury; my ACL completely ripped two nights before we opened the show. I sort of went through this whole experience of, like... It was actually maybe two minutes before I got the injury, I was like, 'This is it. In two days, we're going to open this. I get a chance to prove everything to everybody. People are going to love this,' and then the injury happens and completely flips my psychology on it. I kind of was like, 'Well, that's it. I've just lost everything. I'm going to give it up to the gods, and I'm going to say, you know what, this is going to be my last show and my last show entirely. I'm going to have to find another career.' I sort of went into a doomsday for a little bit. Through a bunch of therapy and a lot of encouragement from friends, within two days, I was able to make it back on stage with a brace on my knee. But doing the show was, like, I felt horrible that this attention wasn't on the show, it wasn't on me, it was on my injury. And that opening night audience got to see me, like, sort of dealing with this injury for the first time. I hadn't done the show since I got the injury two days earlier, and I was just stepping on stage for the first time for opening night with this new thing that I had to deal with. It was really tough and really, like, my brain was working, operating on a lot of different levels, just to deal with the injury while also dealing with the complexity of the show, and trying to do it for the audience that night as well. And then, the show closed a little prematurely. They wanted to go out on a high note because they could see the sales coming, and they were like, 'We see the sales are not...' We're not hitting the way we are. We were in the same season as Come From Away and Dear Evan Hansen, so we had sort of gone through all that. All the Tonys went to those guys. We'd been nominated, I was nominated, it was great, I had won the Drama Desk. But it was just, like, I guess, not enough to sustain the people coming in to see the show because they were going to see everything else that was a big, huge hit. So, people loved Groundhog Day, but it just sort of came in at a very hard time to keep butts in seats. So, it closed prematurely and I was like, I was a little upset about that. I was a little bitter about it. Sort of like my opportunity, my opportunity just got taken out. I literally got my feet swept out from underneath me, and it took me a while to sort of get over it. I'm just being honest with you because I realized later on, and especially through COVID, how much it had actually taught me and how much I needed to really listen to the lessons of Groundhog Day, and listen to Phil, and listen to the idea that we need to let things go, and it's not about your ego. What did you miss while you were doing all that stuff with your injury and trying to do press and do the award shows? What did you miss? I realized I'd missed all this connection with the people that were on stage that really meant something to me. That said, I had a great relationship with everybody, but it was more, like, I wasn't as appreciative with the experience that I was having. I was more focused on trying to get through everything. My focus was a little tunnel vision. And so, I left that with like, 'God, I would give anything to do this again.' And six years later, I got the opportunity to do it in London again. It was deeply profound, and it changed me so much. It made me just closer to Phil Connors and what he has to learn at the end of the show. It made me closer to the audiences that come to see the show and closer to what the meaning is behind it. And it worked out very well. We broke box office records again for The Old Vic Theatre. They wanted to take it to another theater, but there was no theaters available to put it up. But short runs are good for me. I was just happy to do it again and get another shot.
Michael: So, you're kind of saying, you know, if that first run had gone on longer, you might not have learned or taken in these lessons, or maybe not as soon, you know? If you had five years on Broadway.
Andy Karl: Yeah, I had listened to the lessons. I knew the things that it was telling me. I knew how to access, as an actor, all the things that are happening with Phil Connors within the story. I had created my own little stories, and I had personal connections to everything. It was just that my growth from doing that the first time to doing it the second time was an experience that... I don't know if anybody has ever had that before. It was so meta. It was so meta that I was living that experience, but also had this view on it, and to return once again to Punxsutawney, and relive and rediscover how grateful I am for every single second I have on that stage, and every single person that's in the audience. I sang the last song to them every night, and it was just truly, like, a life-changing experience, unbelievable how much it meant to me and how much it meant to everybody that was doing the show. Sort of being able to follow my story with it... I've told a little bit of this story to people, but there's nothing like that experience. There's nothing like it. Groundhog Day will always mean something to me, and I kind of have to celebrate it every year. So, I'm glad we're here today.
Michael: Awesome. I did see that about your injury. I think, you know, you finished that show maybe with a cane, the one where you did the injury.
Andy Karl: Yeah, a little Buster... Buster had the cane to knock on the door of Phil's log. He literally handed it to me on stage.
Michael: Oh, wow.
Andy Karl: I mean, how incredible is that? How incredible is Danny Rubin to write that, to come up with this story? How incredible the creatives were to do what they did. My journey with it is so, ultimately, expanded beyond that; it's more than just a show to me, it was a truly life-changing experience. Not in a way where I'm like, oh, how famous was I from this? Or how I got to sing these songs. It was more about the inward clock of the experience. It was something about a very, very personal level. Yeah, on so many factors. I mean, I can only imagine people who return to Groundhog Day, the actual event in Punxsutawney, or, I don't know, the 20 others that are in America. Like, you know, what does it truly mean to them? It is a source of community and a source of repetition and a source of, like, you know, being closer to the solstice that we are. But I mean, Groundhog Day means to me all those things wrapped up into a full life experience. I'm sorry, I get really profound about the show, and I apologize. I'd rather just tell you the dirt of like, maybe what happened on a Saturday night in Australia or something, I don't know.
Michael: No, I love it. I love how passionate you are about it. It looks like they found the right Phil. It means a lot to you, right?
Andy Karl: It means a lot to Bill Murray, too. He came to see it twice on Broadway. He did his own joke. He saw it one day, came back the next day, he repeated. And I was like, what a genius. Yeah, obviously, the movie, like... He sees it every year; it plays so many times, I can only imagine what it really means to him. But when you go back and watch the film, knowing what I know about the experience and seeing how he's dealing with it, you can see this, like... He could probably go back and watch the movie and know every little experience of what happened that day on that set. When he came to see the actual musical, he just had a great time. He spoke with us for, like, an hour after both shows. He just hung out. He was drinking a beer on stage, and he handed it to me. He was like, 'You want some?' I was like, 'I'm drinking a beer with Bill Murray! With Phil Connors. The two Phil Connors are here doing this.' So, it's touched like a lot of Phil Connors out there. I almost want to direct it now, based on, like, I want to give whoever's playing Phil and all the other characters, because they do, with the musical, you find out more about each individual character that's in that town, which I think is what the musical does very well. You gain access into the full community that's there. It makes you feel something at the end of the show when you're watching it. Like you actually know these townspeople, and then they celebrate snow, and they celebrate, you know, six more weeks of winter, and that's the best news they could think of. Even though some people think it's the worst news, they all celebrate it at the end. So yeah, I forgot my point, but you know, I was just chit-chatting about this show. I get on tangents.
Michael: Yeah. I mean, that's something I think Danny had mentioned. The first part of the musical is Phil being focused on Phil. And then the second part is, like, Phil realizing there are other people in the town. So, you know, you go into it a little bit more. He said it like every character kind of has a beginning and an end. I know Ned has his own song, which is a great song.
Andy Karl: I was just listening to it today. I was thinking, my father recently passed over the holiday, and I've been listening to that song recently. I was like, augh! Wow, it's such a profound song. It's sad, but it's also sort of like, the happy-sad of the passing of life. And yeah, the musical really does some amazing things like that.
Michael: It's tied to the part with the old man, right?
Andy Karl: Yeah. There's something about, you know, as much as Phil's reliving the same day, he can't even kill himself. He's living this day where he's like, 'I'm going to fix everything then, all right.' He thinks he can fix the passing of life, but it is actually... Death is a part of life's journey. The experience of it is something to A) you can't fight it, so actually, you have to accept that it is just as influential as birth and life. So, death is actually something we need to process and something that Phil needs to try to not control. As long as we have the time together, we can let go. And you know, the fact that Phil gets to spend time with the old man in the town who's about to pass away, and he can help him in ways, and he can make him feel better for the day, that's enough, you know? And that's the end of that man's journey, but he has a great respect for death after that. The character of Ned, which doesn't happen in the movie, we find out in the musical that he actually, his wife had passed, and he sings about it, and that's his experience to pass on to Phil. It hits you so hard because this Ned character, who is, you know, a little wild, a little too pushy, a little too friendly, you find out that he's really got some deep subtext and deep meaning to his life, and able to pass that on to Phil. Phil, just, he wouldn't be who he is without that knowledge from Ned.
Michael: Yeah, I talked to Stephen Tobolowsky recently, and he hadn't seen the musical until Woodstock did it last year, but he really seemed to be very moved by it and thought it was great as well.
Andy Karl: Yeah, you can imagine seeing a part of the character that was never discovered, or never put into the movie, I should say, and then going like, oh, wow! You find out that Ned has, you know, such an interesting twist to his life. Yeah, I really wish he had seen the Broadway show or just seen it somewhere. But yeah, that's one person I never got to meet. But I met Bill and his brother, his brother who plays, you know, Buster. Who else do we meet? Anybody else? Did we meet Nancy? Maybe not. I don't know. I was trying to think of anybody else along the way, but those two were pretty, that's pretty profound to see those two, the Murphys.
Michael: That's awesome. You mentioned that you had an existing knowledge of the film, like a very deep knowledge. I found the quote where you were like, 'I've watched it a million times, I grew up with this film.' What appealed to you? Was it originally just, it's a funny movie? Or did you get, like, those deeper meanings, the philosophical stuff?
Andy Karl: As a kid, you're just like, this movie's hilarious. Andie MacDowell came to see the musical, so that was great. She's so sweet, and that's just, like, really funny moments. But the concept of somebody trapped in a day that starts over and over and over again is, like, it's so hilarious, but it is such a profound idea that, you know, in some way, when I was a kid watching the movie, you're sort of like, 'Oh, wow. What does that really mean to live the same day over and over? What a drudge. Jeez, I can't imagine.' And then when he actually falls in love, and he lets go of himself, and he actually ends up with a happy ending, and the day goes beyond that, those are pretty strong concepts that you can grab when you're a kid. But inside of like, you know, how do you change? As a kid, you watch it, and it's like, 'Oh, he's kind of a jerk and then he becomes nice at the end. He learned his lesson.' But like Matthew Warchus and Tim and Danny knew, there's a deeper, richer idea behind it all. I think that's something that I grew to know more of from doing the show. I don't know, Danny Rubin has many more ideas of what it means, but he also doesn't get in the way of letting people... 'Oh, you think that is what the movie means? Yeah, sure. It could be that. Why not?' He doesn't get in the way of people's ideas of the philosophy behind the movie or the show, and I think that's beautiful. I think it's like, here's someone who just got touched with the idea from somewhere in the heavens, and he was like, 'Oh, yeah, I'll do this.' And then, in discovering and writing it and how to do it, I'm always stunned. I sort of see him as, like, this interesting Buddha of a person that just somehow funneled an idea that came through his head, but it's so rich and so deep. It's kind of like, I don't know, Charles Dickens writing A Christmas Carol, that kind of writing. Like, wow, that's something that is going to exist forever. It's such a concept that people can hold on to. Even kids like me see it. But yeah, I have a much richer experience with it now. But yeah, seen the movie a bazillion times, and it was always around the holidays. I think that's why Americans think it's sort of a Thanksgiving, holiday, Christmas thing. I think it's sort of wrapped up in those holidays, which I find really interesting because they don't show it, you know, any other day than around the holidays. So, everybody thinks Groundhog Day is really kind of like, I don't know, in the Christmas-Thanksgiving time, which I guess it is. But it's really a bigger idea than a holiday show.
Michael: Yeah. I mean, it gets into the question is Groundhog Day a Groundhog Day movie, you know?
Andy Karl: Yeah, exactly. [chuckles] Like Die Hard. Is it a Christmas movie?
Michael: Right. Is it a Christmas movie? So, you mentioned Bill Murray coming to the show. I definitely remember that happening when it happened. That's part of the reason why I was like, I can't believe the show is closing, because all the reviews seemed great, and then there was that, it was like a glowing review from Bill Murray, where he was like, 'I wept, it was so great.' And, you know, I don't think he's just going to say that to say that. I think Bill Murray is gonna say whatever Bill Murray wants to say. So, he obviously really thought it was great.
Andy Karl: Yeah, he was fascinated by it. He really was. He was really talking about every little detail that he loved. But he was like, as soon as the music dropped in the beginning, it really hits you. It really hits you, like, in your gut, and you go with the story. And, you know, I couldn't ask for his approval on the comedy, like, 'How'd I do with the comedy?' It's like, I just couldn't bring myself to say that. But I remember when I was a kid, and my parents took me to New York for the first time, and I'm walking down the street, and I see Bill Murray walking down the street, and I'm like, [gasps]. I started following him with my parents, but I was too shy to say hi, and he went to some bank. And I was like, I'll always remember that day, I missed my opportunity. But I guess, like everything else in this life, the opportunity comes back around, and I was able to actually spend time with this guy.
Michael: Yeah, little did you know! So, was that like the only time you met him? He wasn't around any of the rehearsals, previews?
Andy Karl: No. I mean, we all know him as being kind of, he just appears somewhere. Appears in bars and, like, you know, appears at people's weddings, things like that. I was just lucky that we got the opportunity, that he actually showed up to see the show. That's all we needed. And I thought my Phil Connors was far enough away from this guy; still funny, still hitting all the beats, still making the show work the way it's supposed to. But I felt like my Phil Connors is, I mean, I guess the process of, you know, me putting it together. So, I don't think he was looking at it as though I was doing some bad imitation of him or anything, and I felt pretty confident that I had my own thing. However, it's like, if there's any north star to go to, it was Bill Murray's take on that and take on his career. I mean, honestly, that's the thing that scared me the most. But then I was like, 'Okay, I got my own thing going on here,' which feels good.
Michael: Well, you got his approval, his blessing, as did the musical. So, that's kind of...
Andy Karl: Yeah. What better could we do than that? And we had a lot of the elders from Punxsutawney come up and see the show. They were really where they came up in all their hats and all their coats.
Michael: Oh, wow.
Andy Karl: And they gave me a coin, the Groundhog Day coin. I think there's a coin that's, you know, specific to the elders, and they were out there celebrating the show. So, we had one night where they all showed up. I have some good footage of that, it's pretty funny. But happy to have the elders from Punxsutawney.
Michael: Oh, cool. So, speaking of Punxsutawney, have you ever been to...?
Andy Karl: I have never been to Punxsutawney. I was thinking about it this year. I actually have time to go, but my fiancé, I don't know if I can convince her to do the five-hour trip, because she's just coming in from Australia, like, the day before. And I was like, I don't know if I could do it to you. But I really was like, 'Maybe we should go! We should go!' Because my fiancé played Rita, the Andie MacDowell role, in Australia, and it's very, very near and dear, this musical and Groundhog Day to both of us. But I was like, I don't know if she'll go for it after taking a 24-hour trip from Australia to land and then go straight to Punxsutawney for five hours.
Michael: Yeah, I thought you were going to say, 'I don't know if I can convince her to sit out in the cold.'
Andy Karl: Their winters in Australia are our summers. They don't do cold very well.
Michael: All right. So, maybe in a future year, when the timing...
Andy Karl: Possibly. I mean, there's still time. It's not Groundhog Day yet. You know, maybe she'll get an inspiration and be like, 'You know what? Let's just go.' Like, yes! I don't know about traffic, and parking, and all that stuff. I've never been, so I don't know what I'd be getting into.
Michael: Okay. I think you can get some sort of, you know, special treatment. You're Phil Connors! You've got to let them know that you're coming.
Andy Karl: I don't even know who to call. Who do we call? Send me some numbers. I'm going to call someone. [chuckles]
Michael: I don't have any personal connections, but I'm sure I could figure out who you should call.
Andy Karl: Yeah, I was actually looking for some of that inspiration. I thought you might know some of the top people. Are you going to go? Are you going to go this year? What are you thinking?
Michael: So, I've never been there on the actual day. My family and I went there about 10 years ago, a couple weeks before the holiday, just went around the town, check it out, you know, Phil's in the library, so you can see him year-round. And then this year, I went in September. I don't know if you're familiar... How familiar you are with, like, Phil's lore, but you know, there's only ever been one Phil, Punxsutawney Phil, right?
Andy Karl: Of course. Groundhogs live forever.
Michael: Well, no! Only Phil lives forever! Every summer, there is a Groundhog Picnic, and they have this 'elixir of life', which they feed to Phil.
Andy Karl: I didn't know this!
Michael: It's like, in a little mini keg. So, they put this little, little straw into his mouth, and then every sip he takes gives him seven years of life. So, that's the lore.
Andy Karl: That is the lore. I like this lore. That's very Phil Connors. That's him living the same day over and over again, jeez.
Michael: So, I went out to see that this year. But on the actual day itself, I've never been there. You mentioned, like, the 20 other prognosticators that exist. There's actually like a hundred at this point every year, and I've been to some of those other ones, some of the smaller ones that are a little closer to me, where I don't have to stand in a crowd with 40,000 people and be all the way in the back.
Andy Karl: Yeah. I could make it to the Staten Island one. Who knows? It's like Staten Island...
Michael: Staten Island Chuck.
Andy Karl: Chuck! That's what it is. Staten Island Chuck.
Michael: I did Staten Island Chuck two years ago. We didn't leave early enough, so I was like way, way back in the...
Andy Karl: It's huge, man!
Michael: Yeah. Yeah. But again, I feel like if you went, you could probably be out in there, you know, behind the plexiglass with everybody.
Andy Karl: Maybe, I don't know. They could probably be like, 'Who are you? What did you do? Oh, yeah. No, you're not Bill Murray. We're not taking you back here.'
Michael: No, I think they'd take you. So, you know, you've mentioned you've been, this is four times, right? Would you consider doing it again? Does it depend on, you know, the circumstances, what else you're doing? Or, you know... Well, all right, I'll let you answer that. Would you consider doing it again?
Andy Karl: Again, yeah, I feel a long answer coming. So, I'd mentioned that I had intention for the first two, and then when it went back to The Old Vic six years later, I was like, 'Oh, I have an intention. I get to redeem the idea that it doesn't have to be about me. It's about the show. It's about the audience. It's about the cast. I'm so lucky and so grateful to be here.' And that made the show shine even more for me, and as just a production, and to sort of get rid of the idea that we didn't run long, and the injury, and all the kind of stuff, all the things that were hard about the first two productions. When you try to get a show up, it is a monumental task just to get a Broadway musical up. You'll ask anybody that's done it. It is just... It's a lot of work. A lot of people have to come together to make that. So, when we did it at The Old Vic, I had my reason of going back was like, 'I get this opportunity to do it again and sort of know what it means to me. And I had the best time. It was the biggest hit that The Old Vic has ever had, and this is a revival of something. They didn't even know if there was... They were taking a chance on doing it again, because it wasn't all that successful before, or on Broadway, it was not a success. So, they were taking a chance. Matthew Warchus was directing it again, and he was still at The Old Vic. So, all the things matched up, and everything was just like, yes! We did it. And it was just a huge success to the point of like, oh gosh, we don't have... Like I had said before about a Broadway show having... Like at The Old Vic, it usually has a trajectory where we're going to line it up for Broadway, we know we're going to go there, we know the finances and all the stuff. This time around, they didn't know if it was going to be a hit, so they didn't actually prepare for the idea that it was going to go anywhere else. And they really wanted it to go somewhere in the West End, and no theaters were available. That was unfortunate. I really would have loved to have kept doing it. However, I was very grateful for the run we had. But one of the producers is an Australian producer, and they were jumping on the opportunity to do it again. So, they wanted to do it in Australia just a couple months later. And I was like, 'That sounds cool!' I was shaking hands with a bunch of Australian dignitaries on opening night, and now I knew why. And so, they had asked me to do it, and I was like, absolutely! I'm on a roll here with this show. I just love it so much. I would do this, you know, in somebody's garage because I just know the meaning of the show. It means so much to me, but also what it means to people who see it. So, we went to Australia. However, when I got there, I was like, 'Oh, why am I doing this again? I'm not sure I know why.' And then I met Elise McCann, who is now my fiancée, who played the role in Australia as Rita. And yeah, man, this is going to start getting meta again. I met her, and she was everything that I had been asking the universe for, and it just came out of nowhere. And I was like, I was so grateful for the time that we had together. I unfortunately was ending my marriage prior to that, and through no fault of anybody, it was just a matter of, like, there was things that I was desperately looking for in my life and through a partner. And she just fell out of the sky and in my lap. So, my reasoning for that was to meet her. It was to do the show, definitely. And as we all know, in the movie, Phil Connors goes four times to Punxsutawney, this is his fourth year with it. It was now my fourth time doing the production. And the only way that Phil actually changes in the musical and in the movie is when he listens to Rita. Rita offers the advice that maybe you should look at the world a little differently and try not to think of it as, like, this burden of doing every day. How lucky are you to live every day? How lucky are you to have the opportunity to, I don't know, know what's going on? And she's like, I wish I had that power. So, through that conversation, things changed Phil, and he thusly, at the end of Groundhog Day, by taking this new philosophy and encouraging himself to learn more and be more and be helpful, he is released from the magic of Groundhog Day. So ultimately, for me, meeting Elise, who plays Rita, meeting her and sort of being released from Groundhog Day, I felt like I had accomplished everything, so many things that the show had told me. So, very profoundly, in so many ways, Groundhog Day has come to me. So, would I do it again? Abso-frickin-lutely. But I have lived a full, full journey with it. I could find another reason to do it, I could definitely do it. But it's the way, how poetically everything has happened with the show is kind of like, I can now say I've done it. I can release myself and the show. Yet it still, it just holds such a dear place in my heart. So yeah, there was my next long answer to your question. [laughs]
Michael: I mean, that's a great answer. I mean, it really seems to fit. If that's it, you know, maybe that's it, maybe you've gotten everything you needed.
Andy Karl: I mean, I'm not making this stuff up. It's just happened to me. So, I'm like, well, the universe had something to show me with the show, and it had something to show with Phil, and I'm listening. So yeah, okay, I'm listening.
Michael: How did The Old Vic, the second time, how did that come about? Did the producers come back and say, are you interested? And was it kind of contingent on you being available? Or were you, like, in a constant conversation throughout the years, just like, you know, if there's another opportunity.
Andy Karl: I think Matthew Warchus had hinted at something, he's like, maybe we should do it during COVID. I have to mention that Matthew Warchus has told me on many occasions, it is his favorite thing that he has ever directed. And that's someone who has directed huge stars and massive plays and massive musicals. Matilda is another- Matilda is very high up on his list, but it was like, Groundhog Day for him, personally, what the show says is very profound for him as well. So, he was always looking for the opportunity as well to sort of justify how good it was, because we all had, you know, we all went through the sort of like, Old Vic to Broadway, and not doing what we thought it needed to do. I think he saw my journey with it as well. Luckily, they asked me to do it, and I was like, 'Yes, please! Thank God!' They could have asked somebody else, they could have found, I don't know, a celebrity to step in and do it, but I think they knew that I had such a deeply woven idea of the piece, and it was sort of built around what I could do. And they sort of asked me, like, 'Hey, can you do all that stuff still?' I was like, 'Oh yeah, I got this.' [chuckles] I was like, I'm proving it to myself now, I'm showing up, and I'm going to have the best time ever. So yeah, I think it all sort of matched up perfectly. Because yeah, when Matthew asked, it just sort of happened very quickly after that.
Michael: Yeah, I think you're, like, the only throughline through those four runs. I didn't really see any crossover. A lot of times, you'll see, you know, a lot of the actors go through for another run. But it's like, you're in all four.
Andy Karl: It's the best joke I've ever done. It's the best bit I've ever done. I'm like, being the guy who plays the guy who repeats himself, in a show about repeating himself, while he's repeating himself every night. It is literally, like, it's so meta beyond meta. I've tried to write a memoir about it, but I feel like the continuation of it is so... I've got about 100 pages into a memoir about it. You know, maybe I should now. Now you're inspiring me as I'm answering some of these questions so close to Groundhog Day.
Michael: Absolutely, that would be great. And you could come back and discuss it if you do, if that's incentive.
Andy Karl: Absolutely.
Michael: All right. There's quite a few movies that have been made into musicals. Sometimes those musicals are so popular they get turned back into a movie. If they decided we're going to make Groundhog Day the musical, the movie, I assume your answer is yes, but...
Andy Karl: Oh my god, that'd be amazing. However, somebody did a short clip, an animated clip of it, and I was like, that's a brilliant idea! Or Groundhog Day with the Muppets could probably be really cool. [laughs]
Michael: [laughs] I mean, anything with the Muppets would be really cool. But those are two good options. I mean, why not all three?
Andy Karl: Yeah. I was like, I'd love to voice the animated movie of it if you could do it because it's also... Like, because it deals with such magic, and deals with such a... You could definitely do movie magic. AI is great, I suppose, for some technical things you can do, not great for actors, but for the tech of it, it is pretty amazing. But yeah, I really wish they could do it. Who knows? But I don't know, they'll probably get some, like, I don't know, Ryan Reynolds to play Phil or something.
Michael: No! It's gotta be you.
Andy Karl: Okay, Ryan Reynolds could play Ned.
Michael: Yeah. So, how easy is it to slip back into the role? Like, if someone came to you and said, 'We're going to do Groundhog Day tomorrow night,' can you just... I mean, and I don't know if it's different for different roles or with this one, where you've done it so much for so many years? Or do you need, like, a certain amount of rehearsal just to get back in?
Andy Karl: I would just have to relearn the lines again, that'd be about it. Discovering the stuff, I have so many memories and access, and I know exactly how to handle this role. There'll be things that you discover because you let things go, and then when you put them back on, you're like, 'Oh! That meant this,' which happened each production. There was something I was like, 'I just learned something that I hadn't done in 10 years. That's amazing.' But as far as that character, you might see bits of Phil and other shows that I do, or at least he helped me learn how to be a real jerk. It's amazing, like how... In a way that's subversive, where people don't get it. And you're just like, you're not dealing with people because they're not as quick as you. Things that are not natural to me, but because I got to do the character, I was like, oh, I get it. And I know how to play that type of role. More of those roles are coming my way now. I'm playing more jerks that, they don't learn their lesson at the end. But because I played him so well in the beginning of the show, people know I can play that type of role.
Michael: So, if you had to play someone else in Groundhog Day, who would you want to be?
Andy Karl: Well, Ned's great; he has a great moment. I have such a connection to Phil where he has such a journey with things that I'm like, I feel like, I don't know, I haven't seen enough of the performances in a way where... I wonder how much journey there is with each character. Who's the... Who runs the inn at the...? I could play her.
Michael: Mrs. Lancaster? [chuckles]
Andy Karl: Mrs. Lancaster. I think I...
Michael: Like 30 years from now.
Andy Karl: I always thought Mrs. Lancaster, she makes terrible coffee. But I was always wondering where Mr. Lancaster was, and I'm thinking like, maybe she poisoned him.
Michael: Oh, no.
Andy Karl: With coffee. And maybe Phil is like, [chuckles] every time she gives him coffee, it's poisoned.
Michael: Oh, no.
Andy Karl: That was a little joke we were making backstage. Like, where is Mr. Lancaster? It's like, no one knows! He's buried in the walls or something.
Michael: And then we don't find out until the next day because it takes like a day. So, that's the end of the...
Andy Karl: Yeah. And the police come. All these actually could be good spinoff movies.
Michael: I think there needs to be a lot more Groundhog Day content, either holiday-related or related to the world of Groundhog Day.
Andy Karl: I think it's wild to see that concept in so many other movies, you know, that whole repetition, day-to-day repetition.
Michael: I mean, it's crazy that this pretty much started it, as far as I'm aware. And now, you even have, like, a lot of the recent movies or shows are aware of the time loop, and they're like, 'Oh, I'm in a time loop.' But you know, when Groundhog Day happened, it was brand new to him; he had no reference for it. And just the fact that Groundhog Day has become this term that is so prevalent. Like, there was no connection with Groundhog Day and repeating days, or like, a similar situation. Like, that's just crazy.
Andy Karl: Yeah. People say it, and they think, 'Oh, you're living in a time loop.' But before the movie came out, it wasn't really associated... It's just a holiday in Pennsylvania.
Michael: Yeah. One other thing I was going to ask, you have a number of roles where, you know, like this, it's a movie that became a musical. Do you have any ideas of movies that you think should become musicals? Like, what movies do you think could lend themselves to that?
Andy Karl: I mean, I always like movies that carry a little bit of magic with them. Did you ever see Bedazzled with Brendan Fraser?
Michael: I absolutely did. It's been like, 20 years though.
Andy Karl: Yeah. It's truly like... I've wanted to play that in a musical, sort of like, the guy who gets his wishes through the devil, you know, he's going to sell his soul, but he wants to get the girl, so he tries to create different ways of him being better than himself. But then it comes back to actually, you know, facing himself in the mirror and being selfless. You know, it's that same sort of idea of, like, what happens to this guy? He plays multiple different characters, plays a drug lord because he wants to be rich. But you know, everything turns on him. It's a great movie. And I was like, that's something that could be a great musical. One that I would love to see is Coming to America, they should make into a musical. Obviously, I'm not going to be playing in that; I can't be Eddie Murphy. But I thought, like, that's a beautiful, lovely story, super funny. Things that, you know, I just think that would be a beautiful musical because you could... I mean, just the dance alone that happens in his palace with, like, Paula Abdul that choreographed that. I'm like, Oh, it's a musical already! They should do that. And I don't know why they haven't done that yet.
Michael: Yeah, that's kind of surprising.
Andy Karl: Yeah. The Three Amigos is one of my favorite films from the '80s, I wish they'd do that. But you'd have to do it in such a way that wouldn't offend anybody. [chuckles] So, kind of like, can we do that now? Probably not. But man, that was funny back in the day. But it's because the three amigos are, like, stupid actors, and they're kind of obtuse to them being dressed up in sombreros and stuff like that, and people look at them like they're idiots, that at least has to be the way of dealing with the context of, you know, them being dressed up as amigos. But who knows? Maybe one day it'll be able to do that again. Yeah, all those just really funny comedies. But if you can do it, you have to be funnier than the actual movie if you're going to do the musical. Where I thought Groundhog Day, I wouldn't necessarily say it was funnier. I'd say Groundhog Day the musical went a step further than the movie in the way of what it's trying to express about what the journey is, as we all are as human beings, and we should learn to know how to, you know, be better people. The only way to do that is through the reflection of seeing someone else every day and knowing that they have an inner life, that kind of stuff. So, I think they went a step further with the musical, which I thought was great. They took the source material and improved upon it, when you thought the source material is probably one of the greatest movies ever out there. So, it's those ones. I always think like... I actually watch a lot of movies, I'm like, that would make a really good music. You'd probably do it better. I've written a few where I was like... I've written a My Blue Heaven, which is another Steve Martin piece, but I wrote up a couple of songs to that. I think it was like, this could be a really good musical. So, and then, [New York mobster accent] Scoonge: A Mobbed Up Christmas Carol, it'll be the best thing ever. Yeah, I'm also a writer as well, so I've penned a few things that I think could actually make it. But those are the wish lists, the shortlist wish lists of things I think could make good musicals.
Michael: I want to get back to Bedazzled. Am I incorrect in that, isn't that a Harold Ramis movie?
Andy Karl: It sure is!
Michael: All right. So, there's...
Andy Karl: He's got a finger on meta comedy.
Michael: It sounds like, you know, that's meant to be. Got to make that happen.
Andy Karl: Yeah, I would love to honor Harold in that way, and Brendan Fraser in that way. He's so good in that movie, playing all those different characters, be like, an ode to that, to be able to play all those different characters, and come in and out, and the magic of theater and people really following that journey, and learning something at the end! Or not necessarily learning, but sort of discovering how beautiful life is at the end. That's what a musical SHOULD do.
Michael: Okay. All right. So, I think I'm almost done. Did you want to talk about what you're working on now? I saw something about Cease and Desist: A Super Meta-Musical.
Andy Karl: Oh, wow! Did somebody post that or something?
Michael: Oh, is that, is that non...
Andy Karl: No. My friend, Marc Kudisch, was working on that. I think he emailed me last week and said, 'You're doing this reading that we're going to be a part of.' I was like, great! Basically, a bunch of super villains, and they're dealing with their lives. I've yet to actually get into the weeds of the script, but I have to read it before... We're going to do a reading of it in five days. We'll just sit around a table and do that. I've done a few of those. I did a reading last week of another show, like a rock opera of Swan Lake. So, people have many, many ideas, and they are all a lot of work put into them. I'm there to, like, you know, try to do my best to elevate anything that I'm part of. I do have something that's not going to be... I can't say right now, but yeah, something off-Broadway is coming up. I'm trying to think about that. So, that'll be from March until June off-Broadway, and then I'm going back to Australia to do Beetlejuice for a couple months starting in June. So, I'm actually going to play Brisbane and Adelaide and Perth, and I think that's it... and Sydney, sorry. So yeah, those are basically the things that I'm doing now. But I'm also working on producing an Arnold Schwarzenegger musical, [Arnold Schwarzenegger accent] where I play Arnold. I have a lot of voices that I can use. I actually put a little bit of Arnold in Groundhog Day for one bit, and it sparked my mind. The guy who wrote this Arnold musical are the same guys that wrote a parody of Silence of the Lambs that was a big hit, it was called Silence. It was off-Broadway many years ago. I got to meet those guys, and I mentioned, 'If you ever write in Conan the Barbarian musical, keep me in mind.' So, they actually wrote a whole Arnold musical, which actually, we're getting off and into some maybe Edinburgh next year. What else? Gosh, I don't know. Basically that. And I'm still just an actor in this world, trying to find a gig. With all my journeys through showbiz and shows and shows and having profound ideas through Groundhog Day, I'm still just looking for gigs. But I'm so much more grateful for what I do, and I have Groundhog Day to thank for that.
Michael: Excellent. It sounds like that's a bunch coming up.
Andy Karl: You just keep your fingers crossed and keep interested and keep loving what you do. I'm passionate about what I do, and I'm really happy to talk about it, which is why we're here. So, I'm glad we could have this opportunity to talk all things, not just Groundhog Day, but everything. Jeez!
Michael: Yeah. Who do you play in Beetlejuice?
Andy Karl: [Beetlejuice voice] I play Beetlejuice.
Michael: You play Beetlejuice. Okay, that's what I was wondering. Oh, awesome.
Andy Karl: I do this! [Arnold Schwarzenegger accent] I've got the Arnold, I do the Arnold. What else? I'm Phil Connors. I'm a man of many voices, so I enjoy doing character work. I did Beetlejuice in Abu Dhabi recently for ten shows. It was so hilarious. Abu Dhabi is a town; it's very westernized, but musical theater is not a big thing to them, culturally. So, it's interesting. The first eight rows are dedicated to the royal family, they'd show up every now and again. And the back rows are for the general public audience. But I don't think they know what matinees are. So, we had very small audiences for matinees, it was strange. But I really tried to work. If I got laughs in Abu Dhabi, I was pretty confident I'd get laughs later on, which is... Yeah, that's my challenge now is going everywhere and getting laughs.
Michael: All right. Well, I'm going to have to figure out when I can see you in something live. I'm sure there'll be more opportunities.
Andy Karl: Yeah, keep your ears open. Something's happening in March until June, but I just can't...
Michael: Okay. All right, I'll keep an eye out for that. And look, if you get to Punxsutawney, if you do end up going to Punxsutawney this year or in a future year, you can be Countdown to Groundhog Day's official correspondent person, person on the ground.
Andy Karl: That would be great.
Michael: If that, you know, gives you any more incentive or, you know, you can tell your fiancé that, and she'll be like 'Yes! We have to go now.'
Andy Karl: I feel like there's a reason I'm talking to you. I was thinking like, maybe this is just going to inspire me to get to Punxsutawney this year.
Michael: That would be awesome. So, I'll let you go unless there's anything else you want to mention or anything you want to plug. You know, you're on Instagram and Facebook at least, right?
Andy Karl: Yeah. Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. I think I have a website out there that, like, hasn't been touched in 10 years, but [chuckles] it's on the internet, nothing goes away. No, I just had a really great time talking to you, and I hope any of this stuff was a little bit interesting. And, you know, I'm just happy to celebrate right around this time with Groundhog Day and, like, remember how much it means to me. So, thank you for that. I hope it was a good podcast.
Michael: It's been great. I appreciate you taking so much time and all your stories. You obviously have a deep connection to Groundhog Day, and I'm glad that we were finally able to talk.
Andy Karl: Me too. Thank you so much, Michael. I really appreciate it.
Michael: Have a great Groundhog Day this year.
Andy Karl: Thank you, you too!
Michael: Good luck with everything.
Andy Karl: Thank you, you too. Thank you.
Michael: All right, thank you. And that's the interview. Thanks to Andy Karl for being so generous with this time and speaking with me about playing Phil Connors in the Groundhog Day musical in four different productions. If you have the opportunity to see Andy in a show, you should definitely take it. We hope Andy is able to make it to Punxsutawney, if not this year, then sometime in the near future. Let us know how it goes, Andy! Music for this show is written by Breakmaster Cylinder. Show artwork is by Tom Mike Hill. Transcripts are provided by Aveline Malek. If you want to learn more about Groundhog Day, visit countdowntogroundhogday.com. Any feedback or voice messages about the show can be sent to podcast@countdowntogroundhogday.com. Talk to you next time!
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Transcribed by Aveline Malek.