Pianist-composer Michael Garin and singer-actress Mardie Millit are a duo on and off the stage, creating “musical mayhem” wherever they go. Garin is a Drama Desk Award-winning composer/lyricist (for Song of Singapore), who has made a living entertaining New Yorkers, playing piano and singing at the Monkey Bar, the Rainbow Room and the VIP room at Limelight to name a few. Millit has a degree in classical Voice from The Ohio State University and spent many years playing roles like Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady and Maria in The Sound of Music in regional theatres around the country before embarking on a cabaret career.
The pair met each other at Jim Caruso’s Cast Party at Birdland in 2005 and began performing together soon after, most notably on Sunday nights at Elaine’s, from 2008 until its closing in 2011. They have brought their unique blend of musical virtuosity and goofy charm to Manhattan clubs 54 Below, Le Cirque, the Village Underground, the West Bank Café, the Rainbow Room and the Django, among others. Garin is currently the house pianist at the Roxy Hotel in Tribeca, where he plays musical mashups every Wednesday through Saturday, and streams those shows live on Facebook every Wednesday and Friday. Millit’s Live from Lockdown! streaming series (with Garin at the piano) was nominated for a 2020 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Award and can be viewed live on her Facebook page every Sunday night.
As the pair prepare for their Piano Bar Live! debut on Tuesday, January 26, NiteLife Exchange (NLE) asks Mardie Millit (MM) and Michael Garin (MG) Six Questions:
NLE: You’ve been together as a duo for about 16 years now. Since meeting and beginning to perform together in 2005 how has the act grown?
MM: Our act has pretty much grown organically out of our own professional backgrounds and personalities. Michael studied acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse and played piano on the side for years; I have a degree in classical Voice but had been pursuing my true love, musical theatre, for years. We met at Jim Caruso’s Cast Party at Birdland in 2005, and admired each other’s performances, but it was telling each other a series of stupid Musician Jokes that made us want to work together. (Example: “Q: What do you call a drummer in a 3-piece suit? A: The Defendant.”) At that time, Michael was performing several nights a week at the Monkey Bar. I started showing up there and singing a song or two, and sometimes heckling Michael from the nearest barstool. Eventually that developed into our act. Along the way, we’ve learned from each other and developed similar philosophies about what it means to be an entertainer, and learned about each other’s strengths and weaknesses; we try to collaborate based on all that knowledge. But ultimately, we want to keep that combination of serious musicianship and hilarity that brought us together the first time we met.
MG: Also, I come from oddball musical experiences that include bluegrass, Middle Eastern music, Latin, soul and jazz. We’ve been able to meld Mardie’s classical and musical theater history with all that and create oddball toe-tapping showtunes.
NLE: Did you find comedy/wit/”goofiness” together, or was a proclivity toward comedy always part of each of you?
MG: I started my cabaret life doing topical and satirical songs. The New York Times called me a “virtuoso musical wit,” which was swell, but not financially remunerative. At the Roxy Hotel, I found the humor was in the mashups I created as a way to bridge the customers’ differing backgrounds. Like Shaggy’s “It Wasn’t Me” paired with “People Will Say We’re In Love” from Oklahoma. Mardie has always had a wicked and brilliant sense of humor a la Dorothy Parker or Fran Lebowitz, and fortunately for me, it was repressed by the previous idiots in her life. So when I stumbled in, I went, “Hey, I think we can make trouble (and money) with that.”
MM: Yeah, we have both always been goofballs. As a classically trained soprano, I spent several years playing ingenue roles in musicals in regional theatre, but I was always cutting up on the sidelines. I’ve found singing in cabarets and nightclubs incredibly freeing in that regard. For a woman, being able to sing any song you want, regardless of key or what gender it was written for, opens up a world of possibilities. And to have “permission” to be funny—if that’s who you are—is something I still appreciate, though I do still love singing a good Sondheim ballad.
NLE: Joel Zwick called you a modern-day Louis Prima and Keely Smith; how true is that statement?
MM: That is definitely one facet of our performing personae, and one we use often. But since Joel said that (about our 2015 album, “Hey Look! It’s Michael & Mardie!”), we have expanded our repertoire greatly, and gotten both weirder and deeper. Also, just so you know, Michael is Keely and I’m Louis.
MG: It’s a great compliment for which I grossly overpaid Joel. That said, we’ve committed to be entertainers first and foremost. The whole sex symbol thing was a happy accident.
NLE: What is your creative process?
MG: I come up with an idea that Mardie promptly rejects out of hand. I storm off into another room. Then I pathetically beg for forgiveness and do whatever she says. More often than not, it was my original idea.
MM: I have nothing to add, except surprise, because he shows no signs of understanding what is happening at any time. 
NLE: You both had COVID and recovered; what would you like to say about that experience?
MG: It was horrible. And we got a pretty mild dose. I call it the non-Equity version. It took me a few days to accept that I really wasn’t going to die. Although I did email a song list to my kids for a Zoom Shiva should the need arise.
MM: We were unbelievably lucky to have such mild cases! And we also had many friends who ran errands and did favors for us, even making and delivering homemade chicken soup! It really made us realize what wonderful people we have in our lives. And of course, it was easier to go through together. We know so many people who had much worse experiences with it, we almost feel guilty saying we had the same virus. Other than a little lingering tiredness, we’re completely better now.
NLE: Eventually, we’ll be back to normal; what are your goals and aspirations for that time?
MM: We’ve done so many live streaming shows during the pandemic that we’ll have TONS of material for cabaret shows when live performance resumes! I have to say I’ve really come to love performing online; it reminds me of the pretend “shows” I used to do in my childhood bedroom using a hairbrush as a microphone. I really miss theatre, though! I was supposed to have played Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd at the Laurie Beechman Theatre with Dream Productions in October, and it just killed me for that to be canceled! We hope to do it next fall, though (fingers crossed). Oh, and I’m doing some writing….
MG: Yes, I’m happy to announce that Mardie will be writing the book for a musical I’ve been working on based on Ed Sorel’s lovely book, Mary Astor’s Purple Diary (imagine a romantic comedy as conceived by Kurt Vonnegut). I’m writing the songs, so it’s a family enterprise. I also look forward to getting back to my gig as house pianist at the Roxy Hotel. And as a result of that way cool gig, I had the chance to record piano music for an upcoming release by A$AP Rocky, so be on the lookout for that! Having Elaine Stritch AND A$AP Rocky on my resume is why I left Greenbelt, Maryland for this wonderful city. And without the love and support of Mardie, it wouldn’t mean much. (Well, it wouldn’t be as much fun.)
MM: He’s nothing without me.
Here’s a sample of the “musical mayhem” of Mardie Millit and Michael Garin:
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