John Cardoza (‘The Notebook’) on performing the song he considers ‘the ultimate gift that can be given to an artist’ [Exclusive Video Interview]
“It shines a light on the fact that anyone’s life can be special and worth remembering,” reflects John Cardoza about why the musical “The Notebook” resonates with him and with audiences. The actor, who plays Younger Noah in the new stage adaptation of the Nicholas Sparks novel, was “pretty young” when the popular film version came out in 2004 and thus only understood the “broad strokes” of the love story at its center. Now, he credits starring in the musical with “reigniting my passion for being alive at the same time as the people that I happen to be here with.” Watch our exclusive video interview above.
Cardoza originated the role of Younger Noah when “The Notebook” premiered in Chicago in 2022 and has gone “deeper and deeper and deeper” into the character since then. “The deepest piece is Noah and I share the loss of our mothers, so this has been an opportunity for me to explore my own experience of that kind of an event. It’s the most tragic thing and the most important thing that’s ever happened to me,” shares the performer. As he continues his “lifelong process of understanding” that loss, the role of Noah has “reinvigorated my passion for his resilience and his willingness to look for pockets of joy.”
WATCH our exclusive video interview with Dorian Harewood, ‘The Notebook’
“The Notebook” depicts three distinct moments in the life of characters Noah and Allie, and each protagonist is thus portrayed by three different actors. Cardoza shares the role with Ryan Vasquez as Middle Noah and Dorian Harewood as Older Noah. While the actor says that Noah “really lives on the page” in the book by Bekah Brunstetter and score by Ingrid Michaelson, the three performers “at some point reached a similar temperature” by “spending a lot time together,” which involved “finding a similar vocabulary of movement for him.” The musical charts the couple’s journey from young love, to unexpectedly rekindling their lost flame, to Noah helping Allie remember their life together as she battles memory loss.
Cardoza spends the majority of his time on stage opposite Jordan Tyson as Younger Allie, as their sections of the musical see the characters meet for the first time, fall in love, and make plans for their future before Allie’s parents force them apart. “I think she’s very special,” raves the actor about his scene partner, continuing, “She is somebody who no matter how many times you hand her the same scene and send her out on stage, she’s gonna find something new and she’s gonna find some way to breath some fresh life into it.” He credits her inventiveness as “what makes those opening scenes so bubbly,” sharing, “She ignites in me a playful energy.”
WATCH our exclusive video interview with Ryan Vasquez, ‘The Notebook’
Cardoza, who returns to Broadway in “The Notebook” after making his debut in the musical “Jagged Little Pill” in 2019, shares two standout scenes and musical numbers with Tyson in the first act of the show. He describes the duet “Sadness and Joy” as “a thesis statement of character” for Noah because it captures “the essence of what life is.” He notes, “Some days the sadness wins… but there is always some sort of lift in those moments to be found… Getting to communicate that to an audience through that song that is so gorgeously written is the ultimate gift that can be given to an artist.” He describes a subsequent song, “Kiss Me,” in which Younger Noah and Younger Allie sleep together for the first time and in which the audience hears the characters’ inner monologues about their anxieties, as “appropriately vulnerable” and a moment of levity in an incredibly emotional musical. The performer feels that “it’s nice for everybody in the audience to revisit that discomfort and sweetness, it’s so innocent.”
At the conclusion of “The Notebook,” the entire company returns to the stage to sing the coda of the show, a moment Cardoza describes as “beautiful” and “necessary.” “You watch this whole life play out and you really grow attached to these people,” reflects the actor, adding that he thinks of these final moments as a “thank you for going on this journey with us and receiving it and being open and available to us.” “What makes the energy in the room so electric,” he observes, “is that it’s an entire room full of people celebrating life.”
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