The Doctor Is In At “A Beautiful Noise”

Lisa Renee Pitts plays the doctor in “A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical.”
Lisa Renee Pitts plays the doctor in “A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical.”

The Doctor Is In At “A Beautiful Noise”

By Tia Carol Jones

Lisa Renee Pitts always wanted to be an actor. When she was a child, she would imitate comedians like Carole Burnett and Lucille Ball and make up characters. Her parents also saw her talent as an entertainer. She attended a performing arts junior high school in New York, where she is from, and majored in theatre in college.

Pitts is playing the role of the Doctor in “A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical.” The musical will run for a limited engagement through November 24th, at the Cadillac Palace Theatre, located at 151 W. Randolph.

The musical tells the story of the life of Neil Diamond, the singer of “Sweet Caroline” and “America.” The musical has the same name of Diamond’s 1976 album “Beautiful Noise.” Through the sessions between the doctor who is his therapist and Neil Diamond, played by Nick Fradiani and Robert Westerberg, he takes a look back through his life, decisions he has made in his personal life and in his career. Through retrospection, Diamond makes decisions about how he wants to move forward in his life, based on choices he made in his past.

To prepare for her role, Pitts did research on motivational interviewing therapy; where a therapist will ask their clients specific open-ended questions to guide the patient to realize they have the power to change. For the role, she is also cognizant of how she holds her body, always listening intently.

“The writing is so wonderful … so, I just follow the script,” she said.

Pitts wanted to audition for the musical because when she saw the script, it spoke to her. She loved that “Beautiful Noise” was a musical about a very well-known performer and within it, is a very intimate personal story about a man who is struggling with depression. While audiences will get the musical and dance numbers, they will also get to see the intimacy and vulnerability of Diamond and an issue that a lot of people deal with.

Pitts might be familiar to people because she played Verna Griffin, Dr. Dre’s mother in the motion picture “Straight Outta Compton,” about the West Coast rap group N.W.A. She said she never dreamed that she would get to play the role of an icon’s mom. She has also played the role of Viola Richards in “True to the Game” and its sequels, as well as in Stephen King’s “The Stand” on Paramount +, which also starred Whoopi Goldberg. 

“I’ve just had some wonderful experiences in television, as well as film and theatre. I’ve worked with so many of the greats and it’s been such an amazing journey, and now here I am as Neil Diamond’s therapist,” she said.

As an actor who has been on television, in movies and on the theatre stage; Pitts said while they are different mediums, her job is the same: she studies her character, she reads her script and finds out who her character is, what they want and their journey. When she is on the stage, her persona and vocals are louder and bigger to reach the last person in a 4,000- seat theater. In television and film, it is more intimate, but her process remains the same, doing the intricate work.

Pitts hopes that audiences who come to see “A Beautiful Noise” will come to sing and enjoy the music. She wants them to hear Diamond’s story about dealing with depression and to know there is always help available and that they can still live their wildest dreams.

For more information about “A Beautiful Noise,” visit www.abeautifulnoisethemusical.com and for tickets, visit www.BroadwayInChicago.com.


Latest Stories

Latest Podcast

A.L. Smith - Harold Washington Legacy Committee