Tom Mizer & Curtis Moore go behind the scenes on the music of THE MARVELOUS MRS. MAISEL

The Emmy-award-winning comedy series, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, returns to Amazon Prime Video for its fourth season, now streaming! BroadwayWorld Toronto had the pleasure of speaking to Tom Mizer and Curtis Moore, the Emmy-nominated duo behind all of the original music featured on the show.

Who or what are your musical influences and did you have any specific ones when it came to creating music for the world of Maisel?

MOORE: “I grew up listening to a lot of the music of that era because that’s what our parents listened to. Secretly, I also grew up listening to Barry Manilow. I love me some Barry Manilow. I think he’s a fantastic songwriter and arranger so I definitely learned a lot from listening to his stuff. And then we grew up listening to Sondheim and Webber. their contemporaries and I think those are kind of our influences in a lot of ways.”

MIZER: “I agree completely. My household was completely a Motown and a Barbra Streisand household. We know that Barbra Streisand is a fan of Maisel because she gave them so much of her music to use so just knowing that she’s probably listened to our songs makes me verklempt. I can’t even think about it. I think the other major influence, at least for me, was behind Sondheim in the music theatre world, it’s always been Howard Ashman. The cleverness and the heart of his lyrics…it’s the gold standard.”

How different is approaching writing music for a TV show rather than writing for the stage?

MIZER: “I think the easiest answer to that is time. With writing a musical you usually have years of development and you’re constantly reworking stuff. From the first phone call we ever got from Amy (Sherman-Palladino) saying, ‘I might need songs, I don’t know what they are yet,’ to being on set filming, was five weeks. That included writing, approval, recording, choreography and shooting.”

MOORE: “They also have a different set of resources. When you’re writing for theatre the joke we always say is, they give you a pack of duct tape and a kazoo and say that’s what you’ve got to make your show. Maisel is the opposite. We showed up for the recording sessions with some of the best producers in the business, an amazing production team, the best players in New York City and the best singers. It was such a joy to come in there and make the art. You get that in theatre too, it just takes a lot longer. That’s the difference: That you’re immediately thrown into the frying pan.”

Given that Maisel is a period show, did that pose any daunting or exciting challenges?

MOORE: “Tom and I always love to write in a box. The hardest thing for me, and I think I speak for Tom too, is someone saying, ‘write whatever you want, in whatever style you want about whatever you want.’ So, it’s great when someone says, ‘hey, you’re in this box: it’s late 1950s, early 1960s, it’s for these particular artists and then on top of that we know it’s also for television so it has to be modular, it has to be cuttable, it has to be editable and it has to be bite-sized and quick. All that is stuff we really thrive on. Great! Give us that sandbox to work in and I think it’s a lot easier for us to start jumping in with ideas. For every song that we have in the show, we’ve probably written there or four other ones that aren’t in there because we like to write our way into it and we like to give Amy and Dan (Palladino) options of things to listen to so they can choose.”

How collaborative do you have to be or get to be when it comes to working with production?

MIZER: “That was the greatest surprise of the whole experience! In many ways we thought it would be, write a song, deliver the demo and then we would never be involved again. And actually we’ve been involved across the whole process and they’ve welcomed us into the process. We’ll be on set sometimes to actually be there to consult with the people performing the numbers and help shape things and change things in the day because they may realize, ‘we need three bars less because it’s a shorter walk from there to there. than we thought.’ It’s very collaborative. They want everyone working together to create the best show they can. It was a joy because we discovered that all the things we love about theatre and music theatre making, which is the ultimate in collaborative art, actually transferred over to TV.”

You got to write a fake song for Harry Belafonte this season. How do you approach adding a new song to an existing artist’s catalogue?

MIZER: “We really struggled with it at first. It was sort of the hardest thing to do because he’s an icon and he has this huge catalogue of music! Amy gave us a note after we were struggling with it. She said, ‘oh, it’s not one of his pop songs. Think of it as a wedding toast.’ And it was like, lightbulb! We can do this because this isn’t some song he’s going to release on an album. It was he and his band getting together, writing a little wedding toast to sort of tease Shy and his bride just like a best man doing his toast. Suddenly that’s story, that’s character and that’s something we could dive into.”

This season you were tasked with writing everything from a calypso song to a Broadway number. Are there any kind of genres you’d like to have the opportunity to explore through the Maisel lens?

MIZER: “Our biggest thing is we wish the show could run into other decades because we are so ready to write that 1980s electric pop song! I want to see Shy Baldwin’s disco hit.”

MOORE: “I want to do some 1970s funk so bad! Maybe this season we’ll do something fun like that. Like I said, we love working in a box so give us some fun assignment and we will jump into that.”

MIZER: “Every time we pick up the phone from Amy we never know what she’s going to ask for. We’re in the middle of doing season five right now and every time she calls it’s still like, ‘what? Okay!’ There’s no way for us to know and that’s really rare for songwriters to have that kind of range to show and that’s what we’re excited by. They’ve given us the opportunity to keep expanding and go in different directions and just laugh and try and go for it.”

MOORE: “We’ll hang up the phone and be like, ‘did she just punk us?'”

What other famous artists would you like to go back and add songs to the discography of?

MIZER: “If Barbra Streisand wants to sing ‘No One Has to Know’ from season three, I will just lay down and lie my fists down.”

MOORE: “I’ve already mentioned Barry Manilow and I would not mind collaborating with Dolly Parton!”

MIZER: “Now, that would be fun! Why cant Midge do a comedy set at The Grand Ole Opry? And we could write an early Dolly Parton-esque character. Let’s do it!”

What has been the most rewarding or surprising part about the Maisel experience as a whole?

MIZER: “I think what we’ve really learned is that it is so great to just be part of a team. The experience of being on Maisel has been inspiring because the people who work at the top of their game and feeling like we could bring ourselves up to that was a challenge and so gratifying. You look around and from the costumes to the set to the actors, everyone is just so good. It’s wonderful to be a part of such a fully realized world. Amy and Dan, it is their show and their voice and they lead with such humour and intelligence and that’s a gift.”

MOORE: “I 100 per cent agree. It really is that way. It’s a real pleasure and privilege to be part of this team.”

What does it mean to share this experience with someone who has been a partner, co-writer and friend for such a long time?

MOORE: “I can’t imagine doing it with anyone else. There’s just no way it would happen. Tom knows exactly what I’m thinking usually before I’m thinking it and he’s always got my back and likewise, I have his. In something like this where you’re moving so quickly and there are so many moving parts, a lot of things can fall through the cracks so it’s great that we can watch each other’s back and catch everything. Plus, he’s really talented and pretty fun to be with.”

MIZER: “I agree with all that. I think that the years we’ve put in together of working together have allowed us to get to this point where we could trust doing this. If we’d gotten this job 10 years ago we probably wouldn’t have been able to do it. It feels right to have this partnership. It’s such a joy to do this with Curtis who is supremely talented.”

If you could write a musical episode of any show currently airing on TV which would it be?

MIZER: “Obviously The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel we want to write the full musical episode. There’s a secret part of me that would really love to write a Succession episode where everybody sings.”

MOORE: “Yes! I’m totally on board! I love it, that’s a great choice.”

The fourth season of THE MARVELOUS MRS. MAISEL is now streaming on Amazon Prime Video. For more information on Tom Mizer and Curtis Moore‘s work, visit https://www.mizerandmoore.com/

Photo credit: Xanthe Elbrick