I recently had a full blast from the past at the Museum of Broadway and it was so fun! They did a mini reunion for Legally Blonde: The Musical: The Search for Elle Woods, which was the reality show I worked on in 2008. A whole new audience has seen the show because all the episodes are available on YouTube.
I was the vocal coach, and it was wonderful to be back together with some of the contestants as well as judge Paul Canaan and acting coach Marc Bruni. Paul was an ensemble member in Legally Blonde: The Musical on Broadway and Marc was the associate director.
A couple of the fun stories that came out were as follows! Turns out, there were auditions and, after those initial auditions, there were 15 women picked. Those women then went to another audition that was filmed for MTV, and was staged to look like an open call. There were plenty of other really talented women auditioning and, during our talk at the Museum of Broadway, Autumn Hurlbert talked about sister power. This meant, Autumn went to the women she knew and told them, “Just so you know, there are 15 women here who have already signed contracts for the MTV show.� Meaning, even if these new women gave a great audition, they would be filmed being rejected. Autumn definitely remembers one of her friends getting the H out!
And Autumn was part of one of the biggest “reality� show fakery moments! On one of the episodes that aired, she performed for the judges, got some negative feedback, and was seen running off the stage and into the bathroom! Then you could see her legs in the stall, as if she was bent over a toilet and you could hear her retching. The conclusion? Autumn could not take criticism! The timeline showed that as soon as she got negative feedback, it made her throw up. Well, that was not the real timeline!
What actually happened was, all the contestants were living in one giant apartment at The Empire Hotel. Someone had left out a yogurt all day, then put it back in the fridge. Autumn took it out the next day and ate it. Of course, it was completely spoiled. During the day, she had to run to the bathroom to throw up. Later in the day, she performed and got some negative criticism. So, the editors shuffled the events! They showed her running off the stage to throw up after the criticism even though it happened before. And, because MTV wasn’t allowed to follow the women in the bathroom, they had a PA go into the stall and pretend to be Autumn. Yes! The show used leg doubles.
End of story: Autumn hit the most perfect E flat ever at the end of “OMIGOD YOU GUYS.� Watch!
And now, as the weather heats up, I’m looking forward to hanging out where it’s cool…dare I say, cold!?
Yes, my #SethsBwayCruise in August goes to Alaska and, with me, I’ll have two Elphabas and a Fiyero. Stephanie J. Block and Lilli Cooper both played Elphaba in Wicked and Sebastian Arcelus was Fiyero. The amazing part is Stephanie and Sebastian played opposite each other onstage and wound up getting married in real life! It was a “showmance� made in Oz.
And, speaking of them playing opposite each other onstage, they did it again in a different show on Broadway just a few years ago. I’d say they have my cruise to thank! It all began with some “putting it out in the universe� talk on my European cruise. Seb (as I call him) and Stephanie did my cruise to the Norwegian Fjords in 2022. On the way from London to the dock where we would board the boat, we were talking about dream roles. Stephanie mentioned that she had always wanted to play The Baker’s Wife in Into the Woods. We all knew that the Encores! production had just transferred to Broadway and Sara Bareilles was playing the role (brilliantly). "Oh, well," we sighed, "perhaps Stephanie would get to do the next revival."
Just a few days later, she got a call telling her that the Broadway production had extended and Sara had to leave to work on her TV show, Girls5Eva. The question came! Did Stephanie want to play the Baker’s Wife?! Seriously! It was that immediate. The whole thing was smattering of Oprah’s “Secret� mixed with a healthy dose of Miss Cleo psychic-ness. On that same phone call, Stephanie asked if Brian d’Arcy James was going to continue. If he ever left, she would love to do the show opposite Sebastian. The next thing I knew, I was in the audience on Broadway watching Steph and Seb be fantastic!
If you missed their amazingness, here is Stephanie and Sebastian in Into the Woods.
I had no idea the transport from London to my Broadway cruise was a magic wish-maker car. Unfortunately, I must have pondered out loud, “I wonder what it would feel like to have a 15 lb weight gain over the next year.� Be careful what you wish for?
On that same cruise, Sebastian told me a crazy, but identifiable, story about the fear you feel when you are on Broadway for the first time.
His Broadway debut was in Rent, and his parents came to see his first performance. At the beginning of act one, Sebastian was costumed in a shirt, but was underdressed with another shirt for his next scene as a different character. He remembers that he was so nervous that, even though he had on two shirts, his mom, who was sitting in the audience, mind you, could see his heart visibly beating! Seriously.
I don’t know if he has a super powerful heart, a paper-thin chest wall, a mother with x-ray vision, or all-of-the-above.
He eventually took over the role of Roger and here he is, much more relaxed, singing with his co-star at the time (and currently co-starring in & Juliet) Joey Fatone!
Back again to that Alaska cruise, Sebastian and Stephanie are Wicked alums and so is my third star, Lilli Cooper.
This is Lilli’s second #SethsBwayCruise, but kind of her first. Why? Well, for my Caribbean cruise in 2023, Judy Kuhn, Rachel Bay Jones, and Lilli were on the way to the pier, and was regaling her fellow singers with the story of how she showed up at the airport for a °ëµºÌåÓý Cruise through the Caribbean without realizing she had mistakenly grabbed her ³ó³Ü²õ²ú²¹²Ô»å’s passport!
Judy panicked until she realized that she was flying to Puerto Rico first. As Puerto Rico is part of the United States and the cruise wasn’t leaving from there for another day, she had time to get her own documentation. Judy’s story wrapped up nicely, as she had a friend on a later flight to Puerto Rico who was able to go grab Judy’s passport from her apartment. All good for Judy and a fun little tale to tell on a new journey.
Rachel and Lilli loved the story but viewed it as a cautionary tale and did a quick check of their passports just in case they too had mistaken theirs for someone else’s. Rachel had her own passport. Phew! However, when Lilli looked, she saw she had her son’s passport.
P.S. As I write this, I’m realizing that every time someone is on transportation to the dock, whatever they put into the universe comes true. People need to keep their traps shut!
Back to Lilli’s passport debacle: The cruise was leaving in a few hours. First stop, Honduras which is decidedly not part of the United States. There was no way they would let her on the cruise. What was she going to do?
We all joined forces and helped Lilli get a hotel in Miami. Her mom was able to FedEx her passport so it would arrive the first thing the next morning, a Thursday. We helped Lilli get a flight to Honduras for Friday at noon. We thought then she could easily meet us on the cruise. Yay! Problem solved. Or so we thought...
Turns out, that week in the US, there were lots of ice storms and FedEx was delayed. Lilli’s passport didn’t arrive on Thursday morning like it was supposed to. Nor did it arrive Thursday afternoon, Thursday night, or even Friday morning. Lilli’s passport arrived Friday at 12:30pm! If you do the math, you’ll realize that 12:30pm is 30 minutes after the noon flight we booked for Honduras.
In the end, we realized it would have been easier for her to fly back to New York, get her passport, and fly directly to Honduras. Finally, Lilli was able to join the cruise in Cozumel, Mexico, our final stop. However, the flight times didn’t coincide with the cruise’s route, so, out of a whole week’s cruise, she didn’t get on board until the second to last day of the cruise. Just in time for her to do her big concert for my passengers and then the final variety show. I had promised her a relaxing working vacation and it wound up being exactly that…without the “relaxing� or “vacation� part.
So, this time, I’m going to make sure she has the best time on our Alaska cruise even if I must book a sled to get her onto the ship!
If you’ve never heard Lilli’s amazing voice, watch this for a fabulous riff!
In keeping on trend, for my October #SethsBwayCruise, I will again have two people who played the same role.
I booked Charlotte d’Amboise, and amazingly enough, she and I both played Cassie!
I mean, not exactly. She was Cassie on Broadway, and I played piano for the Chorus Line European tour…so…kind of the same thing?
Here I am in Paris back in the day, showing my Chorus Line sass (and causing my back to hurt for the next two days).
However, even though I myself have never played the role of Cassie formally, I’ve played piano for Charlotte performing Cassie’s big number “Music and the Mirror� numerous times�.especially at benefits. Here is a little bit from when we were doing a salon for a Democratic candidate, and she did the entire song in a living room!
The actual booking of actors-playing-the-same-role on this cruise is demonstrated by Broadway royalty Terrence Mann and my other star, David Bedella. David played Dr. Frank-N-Furter in Rocky Horror all over England and Terrence played Dr. Frank-N-Furter on Broadway! I feel like I have no choice but to have a “Sweet Transvestite� face-off on the boat. Whoever loses gets dropped off at our final stop: the Canary Islands. Although, with what’s happening in our country, maybe that’s actually the prize?
Here's Bedella in action!
And here’s Terry�not as Frank-N-Furter, but slathered in just as much make-up and sporting a fabulous wig�.as the original Rum Tum Tugger in Cats!
Join either of my cruises (as well as my recently announced February 2026 #SethsBwayCruise to the Caribbean) by sending me an email or .
Peace out!
