Broadway fans: Get ready for Olivier winner Nicole Scherzinger
Fil-Am performer Nicole Scherzinger won the 2024 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress for the West End revival of “Sunset Boulevard.” Image: nicolescherzinger/Instagram
NEW YORK — Filipino American performer Nicole Scherzinger won the 2024 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress for her work in the West End revival of “Sunset Boulevard.”
Fil-Am theatergoers will not have to wait too long for a chance to see her on stage. The show is set to transfer to Broadway at the St. James Theatre this fall.
“Thank you to Andrew Lloyd Webber, my dear friend and mentor, for writing this masterpiece,” Scherzinger said in her acceptance speech. “Thank you so much for writing music and lyrics that I can sink my teeth and my soul into.”
“As a little girl from Hawaii and then growing up in Kentucky, coming from really humble beginnings, I always wanted to be a singer and do musicals.”
Scherzinger’s father is Filipino. She eventually took her stepfather’s surname.
Concluding the speech, she said, “I cannot wait to come for blood on Broadway.”
The show is set to begin previews by end of September and with an official opening on October 20.
Recognition
This marks Scherzinger’s second Olivier nomination. She was previously nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in a Musical in 2015 for the musical “Cats.” She played Grizabella, who sings the musical’s most famous song, “Memory.”
Theater luminary Lea Salonga was the first Filipino to win an Olivier Award. She won in 1990 for Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Musical for “Miss Saigon.”
Salonga will also be back on US stages next year. Her successful London show with Bernadette Peters, Stephen Sondheim‘s “Old Friends,” is slated for Los Angeles’ Ahmanson Theatre and Broadway’s Manhattan Theatre Club.
After turning down an invitation from Will.i.am to join the Black Eyed Peas, Scherzinger rose to prominence as a singer member of the Pussycat Dolls in the 2000s.
She’s since won “Dancing with the Stars,” served as a judge on talent shows, including “The X Factor” and “The Masked Singer.”
She has played Grace in “Annie Live!” and was the voice of Sina in Disney’s “Moana” and starred in ABC’s remake of “Dirty Dancing.”
In good company
At one point in her acceptance speech, Sherzinger said, “I dreamed of so many roles that I wanted to do. And honestly, this role, Norma Desmond, was not one of those roles,” to laughter from the audience.
“God works in mysterious ways because honestly it’s one of the ballsiest and bravest things I’ve ever done. And I have the incomparable director Jamie Lloyd to thank for that.”
Based on the black comedy film noir movie of the same title, the musical is about Norma Desmond, a faded star of the silent screen era, living in the past in her decaying mansion. When a young screenwriter crosses her path, she sees an opportunity to make a return to the big screen, with romance and tragedy to follow.
Scherzinger initially declined the role. But the director Jamie Lloyd had only her in mind for his take on the musical. In an interview, he said that he felt the singer “had a real connection to Norma’s story” and that “Nicole, who has experienced great things and…in many ways has been dismissed as an artist and has never really been given the opportunity to show the world what she’s really capable of doing.”
Scherzinger is now known as one of the few high-caliber actors who have inhabited the role, which include Patti LuPone (who originated the role), Glenn Close and Rita Moreno.
More shows
“Sunset Boulevard” swept this year’s ceremony with seven wins, including best director, best actor, outstanding musical contribution, sound design, lighting design and musical revival. (“Hamilton” holds the same record of seven wins.)
There are other Olivier-winning shows that Fil-Am theater fans can look forward to.
“Stranger Things: The First Shadow” won the Noel Coward Award for Best New Entertainment or Comedy Play and Best Set Design. This is a prequel to the Netflix show, slated for Broadway next year.
There is also “The Picture of Dorian Gray” starring Sarah Snook of the wildly popular “Succession,” which is buzzed to also potentially making a Broadway transfer.
Walter Ang is the author of Barangay to Broadway: Filipino American Theater. Available at Amazon, Bookshop and other online booksellers.
