On his years at Blue Valley North High School: “We did ‘Evita,’ ‘The Crucible,’ ‘Big River.’ We were doing challenging pieces for kids that age.”

On starting his career in NYC: “It’s a tough city. I was kind of starting from square one. I had no background or experience to know what I needed to break in. So I just kind of climbed my way up.”

On his first long-term gig, the Las Vegas production of “Phantom of the Opera”: “It was an $80 million production. I lived there for three years. I liken it to a second master’s degree. That’s when I learned what it was to really be a musical theater artist.”

On Hugo’s “Les Misérables”: “There are so many characters that stand for so many different things. The bottom line is, it’s about love. I think that’s why it’s one of the greatest novels of all time — it touches on every aspect of the human condition.”

On reading all 1,450-plus pages : “Similar to ‘The Grapes of Wrath,’ he interjected segments about what the condition of the world was at that time. It’s just massive. There’s so much detail.”

On the musical adaptation: “How in the world could they make a concise musical from that book? It’s amazing.”

On the strength of “Les Miz”: “It’s amazing to see how the story connects with people, especially at this time. A lot of things these characters are fighting for are the things people are still fighting for now. You see audiences who are just as young as they are old, and they all react the same way.”