You can't waste time in your life trying to hide the truth.
My mom was a single mother. She had six siblings in a big Irish family, all descended from shanty Irish folks who arrived after the Famine. They settled along the Cuyahoga River. It's the river that caught on fire. We're real good at picking real estate.
Growing up in bars might sound like child abuse. And if it does, then you're what my mom would call 'Protestants.'
Irish music in the local pubs was my first exposure to musical expression, and I feel like Irish music is very close to musical theater because it is always telling a story.
With Irish drama, things are told with humor.
I spent a lot of my time, growing up, at the Beck Center. I'd be in plays there, and I'd get there an hour or two early just so I could be there, where I felt safe and where I belonged. And that's such an important feeling to have as a young kid. The theater community, and especially the Beck Center, really embraced me and got me started.
To watch Lin Manuel Miranda... you could not make a better spokesperson for Broadway in a laboratory.
I think that, as an actor, you fight so hard to get work for years that when it actually comes, you just are so grateful. I am so happy to get to do what I love.
When I came out, I thought coming out meant giving up a marriage and a family. That was, to me, the most difficult part of the coming-out process.
I always thought I would move to New York after graduation, but, instead, I moved to Los Angeles. I realized I was more scared of that choice than I was of New York, and I thought, at 22, I should get it over with.
I loved 'Les Miz' and 'Into the Woods' - I used to cast 'Into the Woods' with my friends, even if they'd never stepped on stage before.
I played Sky Masterson in 'Guys and Dolls' at St. Ignatius. I walked out onstage at one point looking for Nathan Detroit, and I'm supposed to say, 'Has anyone seen Nathan Detroit?' But, instead, I said, 'Has anyone seen Sky Masterson?' I immediately realized what I'd done, so I said, 'Wait a minute. I'm Sky Masterson!'
After I graduated college, I moved to L.A. I started working for the Garry Marshall Theatre in Toluca Lake and did theater at the Hudson Theatre in Santa Monica. I paid my dues by working at every single restaurant in the Grove until they fired me. I worked an overnight shift at the Mondrian Hotel.
The only way to get to that next peak is to be ready for that next valley. Being raised Irish, you know to always be ready for the bad times.
The 'Cheers' family seemed like my family.
I obsessively listened to all of James Lapine's shows as a child growing up in Cleveland and had every cast recording and every VHS tape of 'Into the Woods' and everything that James had done that I could get my hands on.
Mom was a single mother. So three aunts and three uncles and all of mom's friends pitched in as weekend warriors.
The key to doing eight shows a week is maintaining your energy. Getting as much sleep as possible and a big, healthy breakfast is the best way to make that happen. My mainstay is granola cereal, a banana, and soy milk. I also try to add a side of fresh fruit with yogurt and peanut butter toast.
Elder McKinley wants his homosexuality to be turned off. To be a perfect Mormon, he has to put his feelings away.
It's profound to watch a little African-American girl light up when she raps as George Washington and she realizes that Washington's story is her story. That this history belongs to all of us.
