Blue Man Group founder Stanton: "The color blue was an intuitive decision"

Phil Stanton (55) founded the Blue Man Group with two friends in the late 1980s. At the time, he would never have imagined that the band would become a worldwide show phenomenon.

Mr. Stanton, 30 years ago you founded Blue Man Group with Chris Wink and Matt Goldmandie at a gig in Central Park in New York.
Yes, it was less of a gig, more of an event. We hadn't even finished forming the Blue Man Group characters yet and simply wanted to make a statement against the sad decade of the eighties. That was in 1988.

When did you realize that the Blue Man Group would be such a big success?
After we opened the show at the Astor Palace Theater. The show is still playing there today. There was a moment when we realized that not only people from New York's East Village, the epicentre of performance art at the time, were coming to see our show, but also from many other parts of the city, later parts of the country and then from all over the world.

The Cirque du Soleil group bought out the Blue Man Group. What will change in your work now?
Cirque du Soleil wants to leave the show as it is. We have had bigger ideas for shows for some time, such as an arena show, and would also like to produce a show that focuses more on music again. You have the resources to do this and help us to discover a new side to Blue Man Group. But we won't have any acrobats in the show.

The Blue Man Group is also a socially critical show. What is the most important message for you?
There are a lot of funny sequences in the show about the frustrating side of technology. But the show is really about bringing people together, about showing in a creative way that we are all the same under our skin.

Founder Phil Stanton with one of many Blue Man Groups.

Why don't the blue men speak?
Good question. We didn't have any reasons for or against it at the time, we just decided intuitively. I believe that non-verbal theater combined with visual elements and music gives people an extended emotional experience.

And why are the Blue Men blue?
That was intuitive. In retrospect, I could find many reasons for it: Blue is the sky and the sea, and the earth is the blue planet. And the look irritated people. That's why the color blue just worked for us.

You started out as an underground artist. Do you still follow the underground artist scene?
Sure, I go to a lot of shows, but I don't have enough time. But street performances were never really my thing. I came to New York back then to study acting. And I'm someone who likes to build and create things. That's why we put mechanical things together and created new instruments.

The Blue Man Group is now played by different people. When wasthe last time you were on stage as Blue Man?
Five years ago. I miss it very much, I will always be a performer at heart. But you have to rehearse a lot for the role. And I think I'm a bit too old now. Although we also have actors who are almost as old as me.

Do you have to be able to catch things with your mouth as a Blue Man before the audition?
There are certain qualities that we require for casting. This includes a certain amount of coordination, which allows you to quickly learn to catch things with your mouth. But anyone can actually learn that.

What is special about the Blue Man Group show coming to Switzerland?
It contains the latest material that we have been working on. And it's probably the most linguistically reduced version of the show. For a while, the Blue Men followed a voice, but now the Blue Men themselves are at the helm and lead the evening. We like that better. We also have to translate a lot less, which has brought us to this point.

Creative: The Blue Man Group turns pipes into instruments.

You and your colleagues founded the Blue School in New York. What is behind it?
For me, the Blue Man Group represents the human urge of curiosity, creativity and belonging. These three things also inspired us to found a school. We wanted a school that had what we lacked in our school education. But we don't believe that we are doing something completely new, but that we are part of a global movement.

You have been working with the other Blue Man Group founders for almost three decades. That must be a strong friendship!
Yes, it really is. Matt has now turned his back on the Blue Man Group and is now more involved with the Blue School. But we are still very good friends.

What's the next step for the Blue Man Group?
I hope that we will start a new world tour in the next few years. But the focus is currently on being able to present a completely new show in the fall of 2019. Our collaboration with Cirque du Soleil is still very new, so we need to sit down with them a few more times and see what we can do with Blue Man Group and where we want to go.

BLUE MAN GROUP
October 3 - 29, 17, Theater 11 Zurich
January 10 to 21, 18, Théâtre de Beaulieu Lausanne
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