…or How I Got To Watch Pete Townshend Play Air Guitar

By Constance Harvey

Constance Harvey was the press rep at the La Jolla Playhouse when The Who’s TOMMY premiered there in 1992. She was on staff at The Denver Center for the Performing Arts two years later when the first national tour came to the Buell Theatre. This is her first-hand account of the development of the musical, which originally appeared in Applause magazine in 1994.

May 1969

The four British rockers (Roger Daltrey, John Entwistle, Keith Moon and Pete Townshend) collectively known as The Who, premiere Tommy, a rock opera written by Townshend, with songs by both Entwistle and Moon, at a London club. One month later, The Who’s recording hits the charts and, in August, the quartet performs Tommy at the first Woodstock.

“That deaf, dumb and blind kid sure plays a mean pinball … “ — Tommy

July 9, 1992

Press conference. Pete Townshend: “I was 22 when I started to write it, 24 when I finished it. I think that I was young and it was dangerously innovative and, maybe even pretentious at the time, to try and do something like this within the realm of rock & roll… And I think I was very lucky and The Who were very lucky that it worked for us, because not only was it an important step for us artistically, it was also the critical financial breakthrough for a group who, up to that point, had been known for wearing funny English clothes and pop art outfits and smashing their guitars.

“I think now that the story is, in a sense, my life brought up to date. You know, I didn’t quite realize how autobiographical it was. Not just of me, but of the people around me at the time and of everybody in the group.

“You know, it’s a story about [how] the child is the star in the family in a way. And how, when we bring the children up and we make them the stars, we sometimes play a much more subtle and sometimes even more obvious part in their own downfall than we care to really face up to.”

“See me/Feel me/Touch me/Heal me”

 Twenty-five years after the release of Tommy, people still tell stories about the first time they heard it; each story seems to start with the car radio.

“Tommy can you hear me?
Can you feel me near you?”

Tommy inspires a ballet; The Who gives it a “final” performance at the Met; the London Symphony Orchestra releases an all-star symphonic recording; all-star staged-concert-versions multiply; it’s arranged for marching band; and Ken Russell directs Elton John, Eric Clapton, The Who, Oliver Reed, Ann-Margaret and Jack Nicholson in the psychedelic, ’70s movie.

Tommy has a visceral impact, shocks the airwaves, rocks across generation. Tommy. We can hear you.

“Listening to you I get the music
Gazing at you I get the heat…”

November 1991

Hallway in the glamorous, double-wide trailer offices of the La Jolla Playhouse. Artistic Director Des McAnuff: “It’s on.” “What’s on?” “TOMMY. But you can’t tell anyone.” “When can we announce?” “Soon.” Oh, hell. Now I have to get a tape and listen to it.

Cut to 1957

and the too-odd, too smart, too-13-year-old, who could have been the poster girl for rhythm deficiency. Rock & roll? Can’t dance. Don’t ask me.

December 15, 1991

Morning. Barely light. Moving fast on I-15 to L.A. Family emergency. No traffic. Just road-noise and static. Punch up the Tommy tape. WHOMP! Crank it UP! Epiphany.

July 1992

After eight weeks of intensive rehearsal and several months of exhilarating preparation, a new theatrical version of The Who’s TOMMY premieres in Southern California. Pete Townshend, legendary rocker/superstar/composer/musical/writer, has written the music and lyrics, Townshend and Des McAnuff write the book and adapt the rock opera for the stage, and McAnuff directs. It is a first for Townshend — collaborating on the creation and adaptation of a theatrical version of TOMMY.

“ ‘See me/Feel me/Touch me/Heal me; is a line that echoes for many people today,” Townshend says, “but it has never left me…. I am passionate about seeing Tommy grow.”

He was and it did. I was there. Got to watch.

1957 Prom Day

A small, sunbaked Los Angeles workie suburb. Homeroom. Dong-ding-dong. The principal’s voice: “All copies of today’s issue of the school paper are to be confiscated. Anyone seen reading it will be suspended. Return to your studies.” Pincurled and butch-waxed, we page through the paper to!…Bob Mackie’s cartoon of a youth galvanized into morning by the clock-radio whomp of Elvis Presley singing “You Ain’t Nothin’ But a Hound Dog.” What a crackup! Rock & roll. Forbidden territory.

July 9, 1994

Denver. Another job, another theatre. Assigned to write about the pre-Broadway birth — two years ago today — of The Who’s TOMMY. Uh-oh. Blank screen. It’s like your first rollercoaster ride: memories converge to the blur-point. Where to start? Crank up the tape. WHOMP. Oh, yeah, Tommy — I can hear you.

January 1992

When the news hits that the Playhouse will produce TOMMY, the phones start ringing and do not stop for 11 months. All of us have new best friends. They come out of the trees. Literally, and they all want tickets, autographs, interviews.

“Townshend’s-coming-Townshend’s-coming.” The La Jolla litany. It’s late fall and the office hallway holds a day-long processional of whispering staff (“Have you seen him?”)

Des plants Pete next to the reception desk, introduces me as the theatre’s press rep and jumps off to meet with set designer John Arnone, who will win a Tony for TOMMY.

Dark is closing and Pete and Des are to have a working dinner. Not much time for me to establish a connection with — he doesn’t look like a rock superstar. Looks like any other guy waiting for Des. Was I expecting spangles, maybe? So. Small talk. Then — what the hell: “Can’t wait to get my hands on you.”

Pete: (a wary chuckle) “What do you mean?”

CH: “Publicity.”

Pete: “No! I won’t do it!” He erupts into a heartfelt, 20-minute riff on the egregious nature of the press, especially the British press, that tests us both. The production needs him — for creative purposes and for publicity.

We talk. He talks. We talk about trust. I learn some of who Pete is and can surmise what some of the next year will hold. Today, it is enough that, on balance, we both pass his test: We can, at least, laugh together.

McAnuff has that day “whipped me over to a directors’ class he was holding,” said Townshend. It’s a turning point. He’s excited. “I’ve learnt an unbelievable amount since I first set foot here in this theatre… In that half hour, I learnt more about Shakespeare than I’ve ever learnt in my life.” He learns how McAnuff works — with other artists — on text.

Des McAnuff, artistic director since 1983, made his first theatrical mark in high school with a rock & roll musical that also had a successful commercial run. A theatrical rock & roll wunderkind celebrated for vivid, bold, sophisticated productions — he directs Shakespeare as if it were a musical and a musical as if it were Shakespeare — he is eager to marry writers of contemporary music to contemporary theatre. He did it with Randy Newman, Roger Miller (Big River took seven Tonys), Nathaniel and Cannonball Adderley, and The Kinks’ Ray Davies. When Des is approached about working with Townshend on bringing him into the theatre, he’s thrilled.

January through June 1992

Marathon transatlantic phone calls and faxes fly between Des and Pete. They rack up mega air-miles, accompanied by reams of paper filled with questions, answers and more questions about the book, orchestrations, designs, song order, new songs and who will get tickets for opening night.

The start of rehearsals looms. So does the voracious scrutiny that will begin with previews, the first public performances of a production that could be second-guessed to death by zealous rock pundits and TOMMY fanatics.

Is The Who in it? No. Is Townshend in it? No. Stars in the cast? No. TOMMY is the star. Aren’t you really producing this for Broadway? No.

Mid-May 1992

TOMMY rehearses — under tight security — in donated space at San Diego’s Design Center. The concrete floor is littered with scripts, a piano, drums, metal folding chairs, sheet music, coffee cups, water bottles, shoes, duffels and assorted production assistants and stage mothers.

The company — actors, assistant directors, musicals, stage managers, choreographers, crew and artisans — is easily distinguishable from the decorators, clients and wholesalers who also frequent the building. The power — and the pulse — emanating from the rehearsal room is palpable. Civilians wander in — too casually — wanting to be part of the action.

The pace and the pages increase, tension builds, the band and the cast are hot, Pete comes into town, looks, listens, works with Des and the guitarist and, after two interviews, leaves. He’ll be back for final preview and opening night. Ticket sales shoot the moon. So does Des. He isn’t alone. The design — set, costume, lighting, sound, the projections the flying — is sensational and complex. Tech rehearsal is lo-o-ong.

July 1, 1992

First preview. When you learn what works and what doesn’t with an audience. When you give something up — to the audience. That audience — Standing Room Only — holds its collective breath until the last chords of “Pinball Wizard” at the end of Act One, when it rises to its feet. To cheer. It is the harbinger: The Who’s TOMMY plays to SRO and 110 consecutive standing ovations.

On a Dank July Night, 

so humid that the sound board dies and the curtain is delayed, The Who’s TOMMY opens in a 500-seat theatre that is bursting with a wave of excitement and more than 750, including Peter, Roger Daltrey, John Entwistle and the daughter of the late drummer, Keith Moon. Another 250 or so mill about outside. The show? A sensation. The party after? A zoo.

April 22, 1993

The Who’s TOMMY, a new musical, opens at the St. James Theatre on Broadway, sets box office records, wins five Tony Awards (Score, Direction, Choreography, Set Design, Lighting Design) and continued playing eight-a-week for 112 weeks.

“Listening to you I get the music

Gazing at you I get the heat…

Right behind you I see the millions…

From you I get the story.”

Des McAnuff and Peter Townshend Photo by Doug Gifford

I stand in the back. Bracing for the first dip of the rollercoaster, the first chord of the overature hits. Ride of a lifetime. I get to watch.

Oh, right — the time Pete played an air guitar concert? Another story.

September 14, 1994

The first national tour of The Who’s TOMMY takes the stage of the Buell Theatre at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts.

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