A New York City actress has been entertaining her neighbors during quarantine by belting our showtunes and pop songs out her window.
On April 20, Claire Manship, 28, popped her head out of her window and sang ‘New York, New York’ into the alley below.
Encouraged by applause from her neighbors, she’s kept up the nightly serenade — clips of which she posts on TikTok, where her most popular performance has been viewed 1.5 million times.
Ta-da! On April 20, Claire Manship , 28, popped her head out of her window and sang ‘New York, New York’ into the alley below
Popular: Encouraged by applause from her neighbors, she’s kept up the nightly serenade — clips of which she posts on TikTok
Claire, an actor and singer, is used to performing on the stage. Her most recent credits include Bliss at the 5th Avenue Theater in Seattle, and productions in Wichita and St. Louis.
But with theaters closed around the country, Claire had to find another creative outlet — and luckily, the alley outside her apartment provides quite an audience, with dozens of apartments within hearing distance.
‘I knew a singalong wasn’t likely to become a neighborhood pastime. I wanted to sing anyway,’ she told the New York Times.
‘And so, one evening, I leaned out my bedroom window and started singing a rendition of “New York, New York.” My voice was ringing down the alley, and by the end of the song, neighbors were applauding from their windows and calling for an encore,’ she said.
‘I sang for my neighbors every night for the rest of the week. I had been so alone in my apartment that it didn’t even occur to me there were hundreds of other people, sitting alone in theirs, just a few feet away.’
She’s continued the show, singing a song or two every night and posting videos of her serenades on TikTok.
Pro: Claire, an actor and singer, is used to performing on the stage. Her most recent credits include Bliss at the 5th Avenue Theater in Seattle, and productions in Wichita and St. Louis
She said: ‘I had been so alone in my apartment that it didn’t even occur to me there were hundreds of other people, sitting alone in theirs, just a few feet away’
So far, her most popular clip shows her singing Whitney Houston’s ‘I Wanna Dance with Somebody, which has been watched 1.5 million times.
She’s sung other Whitney songs too, as well as Britney Spears’ ‘Baby, One More Time,’ the Backstreet Boys’ ‘I Want it That Way,’ ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow,’ and Carole King’s ‘Where You Lead.’
That voice carries! She has sung Disney songs, pop songs, and showtunes, which can be heard all the way down the alley
Some of her favorites to sing are showtunes, including tracks from Rent, Wicked, and Annie.
Claire also sings a lot of Disney tunes, crooning songs from The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Mulan, and Frozen.
Her rendition of ‘Let it Go’ is one of her more popular videos, with 238,000 views.
While Claire’s audience enjoys the show, she said on TikTok that she is getting quite a lot out of it, too.
‘I’m just so grateful to have built a community in my neighborhood and on TikTok. It’s just so lonely in quarantine and you all make me feel like I’m a little more connected, which is so special.’
In April, Tony-winning actor Brian Stokes Mitchell earned attention for performing for passersby on the sidewalk outside in Broadway apartment.
Michell, 62, has starred in such productions as ‘Man of La Mancha,’ ‘Ragtime,’ and ‘Kiss Me, Kate’ (for which he won a Tony Award).
While stuck at home during quarantine, he began hanging out his window each night at 7 p.m., joining the crowds who are cheering for front-line workers by singing ‘The Impossible Dream’ from Man of La Mancha — which he sang on Broadway as Don Quixote in 2002.
On Broadway! Last month, Tony-winning Broadway actor Brian Stokes Mitchell sang out his window every night at 7 p.m.
Thanks! He serenaded those working on the front lines against the virus, which he himself has recovered from
What a show! Eventually, though, he had to stop performing as the crowds gathering outside grew too large
Below, and across the avenue in their apartments, neighbors cheered, pausing in their masks — six feet apart from each other — to enjoy the free show.
But Mitchell was been looking to serenade crews of ambulances, fire engines, police cars, and medical workers from the nearby urgent care facility.
When they have stopped and listened — as a city bus did recently — Mitchell sang directly to them. And when people clapped, he swept his arms over the workers, as if to say: ‘Not me. Them.’
Mitchel’s gratitude, expressed nightly the last few weeks, stems from a very personal ordeal. He himself is a survivor of the coronavirus, falling ill in late March.
Eventually, though, he had to stop performing as the crowds gathering outside grew too large.
‘I was looking down at the crowds on the street, which is pretty busy, getting a little concerned, so I had a conversation with the NYPD about it as well. And they were getting concerned too,’ he explained.
‘So we both decided that it was better just to stop singing. After all my intention has always been to honor them, not to make their lives more difficult.’
Source: dailymail US
