Utahn now working with theater legends

When thinking of contributors to musical theater, Stephen Sondheim will no doubt be toward the top of any list.

He's won eight Tony Awards (more than any other composer) plus the 2008 Life Time Achievement Award, multiple Grammy Awards, an Academy Award and a Pulitzer Prize. His contributions to theater are impressive, by any measure, and he's still creating.

His latest musical offering, "Road Show," a story about the Mizner brothers' quest for the American dream now running at off-Broadway's Public Theater, stars Claybourne (Clay) Elder, a familiar face to Utah theatergoers.

Patrons of Hale Centre Theatre, Tuacahn and "pretty much every theater in Utah County" have seen the 26-year-old from Springville in leading roles, back when Sondheim was "just someone I read about in my theater history classes," he said.

Today, speaking by phone from his New York apartment, Elder mentions Sondheim's name so casually, it's easy to forget who he's talking about. "I went to Stephen's house the other night for a holiday party. He hates to be treated like he's not like everybody else. You realize he's just this normal guy — with a Pulitzer and Tony awards," Elder said, joking.

Imagine: On the one-year anniversary of moving to the Big Apple, you're singing at a benefit, with Tony Award winner Ted Sperling as your musical director and icon Sondheim sitting at your feet — and you're singing a Sondheim original from the show in which you've just been cast. "All I could do was sit back and take it all in.

"On the day of the audition, everything that could go wrong did. I slept in past my alarm, I didn't know where the audition was — a friend had to call me. I ran down there, I just missed my slot, the casting director couldn't find my headshot. But, five auditions later, they cast me."

In the dog-eat-dog acting world of New York, it's unusual to get a role from an open audition without an agent. "I think it speaks a lot of John Doyle [director] that they would really even look at me and consider me and look past my resume. I don't have a lot of New York experience, and they just looked at what I could do. It was an amazing experience."

Doyle, known for his original interpretations of other Sondheim works — "Sweeney Todd" and "Company" — is another Broadway heavy-hitter with whom most only dream of working. "He's been so great. He's really good at treating everyone the same," Elder said.