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In the version of “You Oughta Know” you sing in the show, the music director Tom Kitt changed the melody a bit in the last chorus.

During previews, Tom came to me and asked if I thought it might be helpful to take that last bridge up to a different melody line because it didn’t make sense anymore dramatically to have me vocally go back down to the basement tones that Alanis hits in the record, after doing that big rock scream. Jo is at that point in the song when she’s really letting it come out for the first time and really letting the rage hit. So Tom and I came up with a melody line that sounded right, and Alanis was super stoked about it.

The song comes after Jo has found her girlfriend, Frankie, in bed with Phoenix. This is a betrayal on so many levels— not only has Frankie cheated on you, but she cheated on you with a heterosexual male. It would make sense for Jo to start the song with wild anger, but you chose to start slowly, and softly. It’s almost creepy.

I believe it was Diane Paulus’s idea to have me not move for the first verse in the chorus, which I love and have always loved. Alanis starts the song kind of at an eight and then builds to a ten for the most of the rest of the song. And I never wanted to do that as an actor because it just wouldn’t leave anywhere for the song to go dramatically. It’s very different to perform the song in concert or to perform it on a

record than it is to use it as a narrative storytelling moment in the show.

I always saw “You Oughta Know” as the first moment that Jo is demanding to be seen and heard. And it always was a song about identity for me. It was never really a song about being cheated on or getting back at your ex. It wasn’t divorced from that, but it went deeper to the core of needing to be seen as valid. When you sing it as an actor, there’s a musical break in between the words “I’m here” and then “to remind you.” The chorus always starts with a huge “I’m here.” I feel like I’ve unlocked so many more variations of Jo’s experience of finding a way to say, “I’m here.”

I think we have to talk about the standing ovations. Starting with the Cambridge run, “You Oughta Know” has brought the audience to their feet almost every night.

Oh yeah. That’s never something you expect. I think we always knew that it was going to be a big moment for the show. It’s arguably her most famous song, or at least one of her most famous songs. I actually was quite nervous; the first preview in Cambridge was really the only time I

felt pressure singing the song because I had been in such an incubated, loving, supportive environment in the development. It was the first time doing it in front of a paid audience. And we had heard that a lot of massive Alanis fans had flown in from all over the world to see the very first

“The song took on
a new dimension when
it came out of the mouth
of a queer woman.”