NR: Hmm, maybe that's the answer to my next question. I was going to ask, "How did you make it your own?" considering that you had Terry (Mann) and Rex (Smith) before you, with two very different interpretations.

MK: It doesn't matter. It never matters who's done it before - NEVER. People will look and they will say, "He took a little bit of what this one did, he took a little bit of that one." Well, you'll recognize a little something similar, but it doesn't matter if they've done it ten thousand times or if I'm the first guy to do it. The way I approach a character is the same in any given situation. Plus, we had a full rehearsal process with this. I had very strong opinions about the character. I originally auditioned for it.

NR: Really? I didn't know that. For the first version or the second?

MK: The first one. I was requested in for the audition, and I went in the same day that Terry went in. I think I was in right before or after Terry. They had a different idea of the role at the time - obviously. Terry and I are incredibly different people. They did Terry and then they did Rex, and I think they just wanted to rethink the approach to the character of Chauvelin. I always approach a character from here (indicating his head.) To me, it's always about "why?" It's always the "why." Chauvelin's the villain - why? Chauvelin's evil - why? (If you want to call it evil. I don't call it evil.) It's always the "why." That's the important thing, because the minute that you get the "why," you now are getting that person's individual personality.

NR: Why is Chauvelin the way he is?

MK: Oh, come on. Look at him.

NR: I want to hear your version.

MK: He's lower class. There's no way ever he would ever be able to be in the position that he's in in any other situation than military. Consider it. Even Bobby (Longbottom) said the same thing. Always we draw a comparison to Hitler. Not to say that he's a Hitler, but here's a very bright man that's very lower class, that given a very unique situation, is able to use his charisma and his wit - his particular wit - and his driving ambition to raise himself to a status that he would not usually get to. Chauvelin is not a creature of society. Chauvelin is a creature of action. He's a creature of ambition. He's a Richard the Third. He was not built for times of peace. He believes in the French Revolution because he rationalizes that it gives him a great stature in that society.

At the same time, he's not one who likes to lose things because he never really had them to begin with. Marguerite is the closest thing he's ever had to love, so it's a very obsessive, visceral kind of thing. She's a real partner for him. She's got as much guts and fire as he does and he likes that. He doesn't want a woman that's just going to be "there." He wants someone that is going to fight. He likes the challenge. He's always up for the challenge. That's what makes him interesting to me. He's very desperate. He's very ripped by her. The fact that she would actually leave France...he felt the whole time that she was fighting next to him, that she was into it, that she was with it, that she understood it. Now she's going off with this...It's what makes it easy for me to understand why he misses Percy all the time because that's not the way they fought, not in this time period. Guys walked out in the middle of a field. They looked at each other head on and the better of the fighters was the one that was still standing - period. You didn't hide in the bushes. You didn't hide in a costume, or behind a different personality. You didn't. That was not a hero. Not according to Chauvelin, not according to the period. It was a very avant garde idea to disguise in another personality. Not such an old idea - Hamlet does it, then later, into the 30's and 40's, Batman, Superman. The idea of disguising oneself, but really the idea of Percy was a very original idea, which is why at the end of the show when we're fighting, and I say, "So, a hero" - there he is - finally. He's not disguised. In all his glory, there's the man I've been looking for. That's why there's humor in the situation because you see the frustration of him trying to find something that's right under his nose. It's there the whole time. It doesn't make him stupid though. That was very important to me. Chauvelin is not an idiot. He's just so aggressively trying to find...like you know, "Where the hell are my keys?" when they're in your hand. But you're so intent on finding them that you're not stopping to observe for a minute that they're in your hand. That's the kind of character he is...to me. He's driven and his humongous flaw is Marguerite.

NR: Let's talk about Marc now. You've got all these other projects going on at the same time. You have all these other shows, the Toyota commercial, all this stuff. Can you tell me a little bit about them? Let's start with Thoroughly Modern Millie.

MK: We just finished doing the workshop. It's supposed to go into production this coming fall. Millie starts in the summer and then it comes in in the fall.

NR: Do you think you're going to be doing that?

MK: Yeah. I have The Wild Party first.

NR: When is that?

MK: January. It starts in January and opens in the spring. I don't know how commercial it's going to be. It doesn't matter. I want to do it because it is what it is.

NR: You're just doing that for a short time and then you're going to jump into Millie?

MK: Yeah, as it stands now. They've already offered me Millie. It's that thing of, "Hey, I've got two jobs." Once again I'm playing...well, in The Wild Party the guy I'm playing is not very nice at all - extremely different than any of this. Very different. I'm playing a bisexual hedonist. I play a good guy in Thoroughly Modern Millie but I don't get the girl. I NEVER get the girl!

NR: Are you doing anything else?

MK: I did the Christmas CD for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

NR: Is that the one with Jim Hindman or the other one?

MK: Actually I'm doing both. Also, my fiancee and I and Carolee (Carmello) were rehearsing for the thing for Hillary Clinton at Ford's Center. The three of us sang and I sang "Soliloquy" with rewritten lyrics so instead of "My Boy, Bill" it was "My Girl, Hill." It was great, but it was a lot. It was wonderful stuff.

NR: That's a tough song.

MK: It wasn't the song as much as it was just remembering lyrics. Every baritone with his "badge" knows "Soliloquy." So, just remembering these lyrics, and then the fact that it is "Soliloquy," it was tough. Actually while I was doing that I came to the show and I had this little frog in my throat at the end. I can always tell if there's something wrong when I'm really tired because the "Where's The Girl?" reprise is the place to tell me. It's the hardest song in the show for me to sing. It's how it sits - it sits really high. I'm a baritone. I'm not a tenor. I'm not like Rex Smith. I'm a baritone. I'm more like Terry. I can sing it but it's very high in my range. I had a little frog in my throat on Thursday night and when I came back in I had the same frog. Everything else was great but it was right there. Then I started wondering, "What's this now?" I was praying that it wasn't a chronic thing. Saturday morning I woke up and as I was warming up, everything was fine until I got into the upper part of my voice. It just wasn't happening, so I thought, "OK, I know there's swelling, but why? Oh no, is this from me being tired, or misusing my voice?" I looked at my throat in the mirror, and sure enough, it was an infection, which made me so happy because it wasn't me doing something vocally wrong.

Interview conducted and photographs by Nancy Rosati.