SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, Aug. 2, 2024 (Gephardt Daily) — If you think playing just one Schuyler sister in “Hamilton” would be exhausting, how about being ready at any time to go on as any one of the three of them?
Well, that’s the job of standby Jisel Soleil Ayon as the “Hamilton” (Philip) tour comes to the Eccles Theater in downtown Salt Lake City, running for a month through Sept. 1. For tickets and more information click here.
The epic saga of “Hamilton” follows the rise of Founding Father Alexander Hamilton as he fights for honor, love, and a legacy that would shape the course of a nation. Based on Ron Chernow’s acclaimed biography and set to a score that blends styles including hip-hop, jazz, R&B, and Broadway, the show has had a profound impact on culture, politics, and education since its debut in 2015.
With book, music, and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda, it has won 11 Tony Awards, as well as a Grammy Award, Olivier Awards, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and an unprecedented special citation from the Kennedy Center Honors.
The show details Hamilton’s involvement in the American Revolutionary War as an aide-de-camp to George Washington; his marriage to one of the Schuyler sisters, Elizabeth; his career as a lawyer and secretary of the treasury; and his interactions with Aaron Burr. The three sisters, Elizabeth (Eliza), Angelica, and Peggy are introduced in the song “The Schuyler Sisters” as they reveal their background and ambitions. At a ball hosted by Philip Schuyler, Elizabeth falls helplessly in love with Hamilton, who reciprocates her feelings, as Angelica suppresses her own desires for the sake of their happiness.
Ayon joined the tour in 2022 as the off-stage standby cover for all three Schuyler sisters, meaning she can step into any one of the sister tracks whenever she is needed. Ayon earned her Bachelor of Arts in Theater Arts at California State University, Fullerton, and you may have seen her on stage in Utah in the past; she was in “Guys and Dolls” as Sarah Brown, and in “Les Misérables” as Cosette at the Hale Centre Theatre in Sandy, both in 2021.
We chatted with Ayon by phone from the “Hamilton” tour stop in Tempe, Arizona. We first asked her about her time in Utah before; she auditioned out of California with a self-tape, then drove to the Beehive State for rehearsals and the run of the shows.
“I did live in Utah for eight months; I worked at the Hale Center Theatre in Sandy,” she said. “So literally, I was just there for that reason. I auditioned towards the very, very beginning of my career. So I auditioned because it was the only theater that was really operating; it was earlier on in the pandemic. I auditioned out of just, you know, throwing it into the wind, and they cast me. So I went out there, and I did ‘Guys and Dolls’ and ‘Les Mis,’ and I was there for eight months before I moved on to the next thing. So I’m very excited to be going to Salt Lake, and I have a community of friends there. I’m so happy to be seeing them and spending time with them.”
Ayon said she has various things she’d like to do while she’s here in Utah for a month.
“I’m actually going be driving the four hours north to Yellowstone. My plan was to do that when I was there last and I didn’t get time, so I’m going to do that for sure,” she said. “I’ve got some people that want to do farmers markets and hikes and all sorts of fun things. I’m going to be staying busy seeing my friends.”
We also asked her about her time touring with “Waitress.” In October 2021, she stepped into the lead role of Jenna in the second Broadway national tour, a role she played until June 2022. The character of Jenna spends just 11 minutes offstage in a show that runs just under two-and-a-half hours.
“It was my first tour, my first really big role and big project,” she said. “The biggest contract I had booked up until that point, so it was very, very exciting, and it’s a show that I just adore the music; the role was a dream to play. Everything about that show and that role, getting to step into that was amazing; definitely tougher than the non-union schedules; typically they’re really, really fast, so touring with that tour was very exhausting, but I wouldn’t trade that experience for anything.”
We also asked Ayon to tell us more about her journey with “Hamilton” and how being a standby works.
“I teach people about this a lot,” she said. “I joined as and am still a standby. So the word standby for us means that you are someone who is offstage, so you are not in the show every night, and you cover one or multiple principal tracks. So for me, specifically in ‘Hamilton,’ that means that I am backstage every night and can go on at any given moment for Angelica, Eliza or Peggy/Maria, which is played by the same person, so we call that one track. So I cover, technically, three tracks. So if someone goes on vacation and it’s scheduled out, I might know a couple weeks in advance. So if someone is going on vacation, I know I’ll be going on for a sister there. Or if someone calls out day of because they’re sick or they just need a personal day, then I can also step in, or if something emergency-wise happens during the show, I can also step in.”
She added: “So the term cover kind of encompasses all of my types of role. So standby, understudies, alternates, swings, they’re all slightly different terms, so we all do definitely have a certain skill set. Like, this is the first time that I have covered multiple roles. So when I stepped in, I was like: ‘Can I even do this?’ You know? Like, you kind of ask yourself. And I have friends who have not covered multiple tracks before, and they go: ‘Oh, I could never do what you do.’ And I tell them: ‘No, that’s not true.’ I think everyone can do this. It’s just tough. You’ve got to put in the work. You’ve got to figure out a system for yourself. Some people really like physical scripts and writing things down and different colored highlighters and things like that. Some people like their iPads, and there are different apps that you can have different colors on your iPad. So you just have to figure out your own system. And I think everyone’s capable of it, but it’s definitely hard work. I think it’s just a challenging job. We all put in the work, and I think it’s really awesome. And then it’s so rewarding to see your fellow artists go on and do the thing and kind of save the day for the show.”
We also asked Ayon what methods she uses to keep herself physically, mentally and spiritually healthy on tour, particularly when she doesn’t know if she’s going on every night.
“It can be tough, and I will say that, while I think everyone is capable of doing this type of job, it’s definitely not conducive to everyone’s lifestyle and how they feel like they can best take care of themselves,” she said. “It’s a different type of exhausting to not do the show, but to know that at any given moment, you could. If you technically look at it, right, the people who are in the show every night are literally doing the show every night, and that is exhausting, physically, mentally. It is a very different type of exhaustion to sort of feel like you have to be on and ready all the time. And it’s definitely not for everybody. To answer, like, what I do, I honestly just have to lean into self-care in whatever way that means for me. For me a lot of times, it’s just sort of filling my life with joy wherever I can, and whatever that joy means to me. So for me, it’s spending my time outside of the theater, really, typically spending time with people. People are my favorite part of life, and connecting with people really fuels me. I’m an extroverted extrovert. So social interactions really recharge my battery, interactions with people, with my people. And doing that helps me sort of be charged to go to work, right?
“So, it’s both doing the work, the self-care work in the theater and outside of the theater. So, in the theater, I also am filling my time with something sort of distracting in a way. If I just sit and just listen to show and just wait for potentially something that could happen, that’s just not very healthy for me. So I’ll do whatever might be distracting; I do crafty-type things; right now it’s cross-stitching. I read books, I might just throw on a TV show, you know, a comfort show or anything like that, that just sort of like allows me to not solely focus on a potential emergency or whatever. And I’ve also obviously done the work, and I’ve been in the show for almost two years now. So at this point, the roles are in my body in a way that I don’t have to feel like I need to review every single day. When I joined, it was definitely more taxing because I didn’t feel like I knew the roles well enough to feel like I could completely be able to just escape into a book every show or anything like that. That was more of an OK, you know, watch the show every other day, practice the show, whereas now I can be a little more relaxed with it and know that it’s in my body, and I know that I don’t have stress and I just do what I want to do, that is just fun and distracting, and then go in and do my job.”
We also asked Ayon what’s still on her bucket list as far as roles go.
“Yeah, there’s plenty; there’s so much out there that I would love to tackle,” she said. “One of my biggest right now that’s at least currently on Broadway, it’s ‘Hadestown;’ a lot of women have that as a dream show. I would love to try and take on [the role of] Eurydice, and that’s just one of my favorite shows that’s on Broadway right now. Some other ones, I mean, gosh, there’s so many. There’s an off-Broadway show called ‘Daddy Long Legs’ that doesn’t get done very often, I would live for doing that show, the role is called Jerusha. It’s a two-person show. There’s just so many good shows. ‘Shucked,’ I was like, ‘Oh, I would love to do this show’; ‘Some Like it Hot’ was such a blast to watch, I lived for that show. There’s a lot of work I’d like to do dream-roles wise, but then, really, ultimately, the dream is to originate new works; that would be the blueprint.”
Finally, we asked Ayon what a perfect day looks like for her.
“I haven’t had my own home in over three years now,” she explained. “So I am buying an apartment very, very soon, closing on an apartment [in the New York area]. And so the dreams that I’ve had of building this home to be exactly what I want it to be, and being able to host my friends in my space, and things like that, like I think my ideal day, in that sense, hasn’t happened yet, and I’m very, very excited for that to come. Yeah, but I think just, it’s definitely spending time with people that I love, who care about me, and I like activity-based hangouts. So, you know, a craft night, a girls’ movie night, or we all go to an escape room, just doing fun things, with people that I love.”
For more information about Ayon, click here, and for more information about “Hamilton” and for tickets, click here.
