“I Carry Myself Differently in Heels”: Nicole Scherzinger, by Lin-Manuel Miranda

Nicole Scherzinger’s entire life has been preparing her for this moment—her teenage years studying acting, her drama-filled time as the standout member of the Pussycat Dolls, a bumpy solo career, and even a stint on Dancing with the Stars. This fall, the 46-year-old pop diva is taking Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical adaptation of Sunset Boulevard from the West End to Broadway, reprising the character of Norma Desmond, an out-of-work silent film star with dreams of reclaiming her place in Hollywood. On the surface, the role might have parallels to Scherzinger’s own life, but as she tells Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, it’s deeper than that.

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THURSDAY 10 AM SEPTEMBER 5, 2024 NYC

NICOLE SCHERZINGER: Hi, are you there?

LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA: Hi!

SCHERZINGER: How are you, Lin?

MIRANDA: I’m good! Are you in the city rehearsing?

SCHERZINGER: Yes, I flew in late last night. It’s my first night and morning in the apartment so I was ripping into boxes being like, “Where’s my shower stuff ? I got to shower before I see Lin.”

MIRANDA: I’m literally running from doing exactly the same. I’m fresh out of the shower. It’s great to see you.

SCHERZINGER: You too. It’s great to be here.

MIRANDA: It will be very difficult to keep this from being me singing your praises for 30 minutes, because I was lucky enough to see it on the West End, and I thought I knew Sunset Boulevard and I thought I knew your voice—I realized I knew fucking nothing. You give one of the most electric performances I’ve ever seen onstage, which is why I was so thrilled to get to talk to you about it. How did you first talk to Jamie Lloyd, your director, about this piece? How the fuck did this happen?

SCHERZINGER: First of all, this is a dream come true. I can’t get into it because then I’ll start crying that you even agreed to do this. I know you’re so busy, so thank you. What was the question?

MIRANDA: The question is, how did the conversation about Sunset Boulevard start? What was your history with the show, and how on earth did you pull the entire thing apart and put it together in this incredible new way?

SCHERZINGER: Well, we have Jamie to thank, or to blame, for all of this, because he came to me. He wanted to work with me a few years back and I wasn’t able to work it out in my schedule. So he was like, “When are you coming to New York next? Because I need to speak to you about something in person.” We actually met at the Savoy, if you can believe it, and he said, “I’ve got this amazing idea. I had this dream and it’s for you to play Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard.” Babe, I was like, “I’m trying not to be insulted right now.” I showed up cute. I think I had an entourage. [Laughs]

MIRANDA: In the original movie, it’s this faded movie star in the twilight of her life. That does not describe you.

SCHERZINGER: Well, I didn’t know the musical. I only knew the film, and I was like, “That’s your big idea? That’s how you see me? As a strange, old, faded, discarded movie star?” I think my reaction was like, “Honey, I still look good under bright lights.” He said, “Can I send you the script?” I’m thinking, “Yeah, I guess you could send it, but whatever. I’ve seen the film.” He said, “Don’t think about the film. Read the script. It’s different.” So when I read the script, I empathized with her, I understood her. It wasn’t at all the interpretation that I had of her from the film. In the film, it was a depiction through someone else’s perspective, it wasn’t Norma’s real story. When I read the script, I understood her story. Then I listened to the music and I couldn’t believe it. That’s when I fell madly in love with her.

MIRANDA: “With One Look” was what I remembered from the score, walking into your production. But also, what I remember from the production I’d seen on Broadway, all those years back, was the huge set.

SCHERZINGER: I heard that it got a standing ovation, the set alone.

MIRANDA: Correct, and the enormous spiral stairway. But you guys went the opposite direction. It’s you on a bare stage a lot of the time, and I say that as the best compliment ever. You strip away what you’re seeing and suddenly, the brilliance of the score really jumps out. It’s front and center. The other thing I’ll say is, I love movies. I’ve directed movies. We’ve worked together on a movie.

SCHERZINGER: Yes.

MIRANDA: I don’t necessarily love video projections at a theater. I’ve never really seen it used well. It’s always distracting me from the humans onstage. But the way Jamie used film and video to highlight the fact that this was a movie star, and that you, with one look, can break our hearts, is so tremendous. I’ve never really seen another director do what he’s doing with it, in a way that never takes away from the bodies onstage. It always serves them. At the risk of a spoiler, when the opening credits rolled, I was like, “Oh, shit. We’re in such good hands. We’re going to be taken away.”

SCHERZINGER: Wait, there’s opening credits?

MIRANDA: Yeah. When the credits roll on the screen as the musical is going.

SCHERZINGER: Oh, because I’ve never seen it. So there’s credits?

MIRANDA: Oh, fully. Like we are in this movie-musical hybrid, a Jamie Lloyd production.

SCHERZINGER: Oh my god.

MIRANDA: I screamed. I was next to J.J. Abrams and we were just high-fiving each other.

SCHERZINGER: This is awesome because I didn’t even know there were opening credits. I knew that there were ending credits, right?

MIRANDA: Maybe I’m confusing the two. But the way the screen is used and the way the camera is used so that you get to burn the house down, get your close-ups, it’s just incredible.

SCHERZINGER: You might not be confused. There might be opening credits. The problem is I’ve never seen the show. I’ve never been allowed to see rehearsals back. And whatever you’re talking about, the screen is down, but I’m in a chair upstage in the dark. So people don’t realize that I’m onstage 98 percent of the entire show, whether you see me or not. So I’m always plugged into the grid, as we call it. Jamie and I spoke for at least six months before we started rehearsals, picking apart the characters and the script, and I kept saying things like, “I have no motivation to do this if someone doesn’t love me or isn’t interested at all.” I was telling him issues that I had with the character and the way it was done in the past. And he was like, “Throw it all away. We’re going to start brand new.”

MIRANDA: You are in a nightie slip of a dress, which makes you so vulnerable onstage. I want to talk a bit about that vulnerability. What does it feel like to be that vulnerable onstage for that much of the time? Because you don’t have a lot of armor.

SCHERZINGER: That was all in the prep work that we did, Lin. I really trust Jamie. I have a very strong, deep relationship with him. We must be brother and sister from another life. Before we started this journey, I’d speak to him for hours about my life, so when I got there, the first thing he said was, “Two words: Be open.” We workshopped a lot of things, but there came a time where—I hate my feet and I abhor anyone looking at my feet, it’s just not my jam—and he was like, “You’re barefoot.” I was like, “When are my cute shoes coming?” I’m a Pussycat Doll. I carry myself differently in heels. He was like, “No, you’re barefoot.” That really pushed me. Then he introduced the camera. The first day, I was like, “We need to focus on this side, okay?” And he immediately moved the camera to the other side. I was like, “I’m not even myself when the camera’s on that side, I don’t know what to do.” But he challenged me. I still fight with him and say, “Can’t I have a piece of jewelry?” And he’s like, “No.” He was like, “You’re not going to be wearing this stuff when you’re a sleepwalker. Norma’s a sleepwalker.” So we stripped it all back and that is how I was able to build my armor up.

MIRANDA: Oh, wow.

SCHERZINGER: Yeah, when I’m onstage and I’m super bare, it’s important to not have the armor because that’s not what it’s about. It’s the opposite. I always say I cut my heart completely wide open and flip it inside out so that you see the ugly, so that you see those many different facets and crevices of the inner workings of where she’s from. Maybe that’s why he has me in that damn slip, because you have to be fully exposed to tell the fucking truth.

MIRANDA: It’s an astonishing performance, Nicole. How are you feeling having this dazzling triumph? Now, you have other gigs, like being a world-famous pop star. You go be Hannah Montana for a while and then you come back to this. What does it feel like?

SCHERZINGER: It’s crazy because you’re right, I do wear many other hats. But everything in life is all about connection and being of service. And so sometimes, you’re like, “How can I best connect in this medium?” I haven’t thought about it at all, Lin, because I’m not trying to hype myself up. By the grace of god, it was well received on the West End. My brain is a bit neurotic. It spirals like Norma’s. I call myself the real-life modern Norma Desmond and nothing is ever good enough. Poor Jamie always has to hear me say, “It can be better.” He’s like, “It’s good where it’s at.” I’m like, “We can make stronger choices.” I have to go fly and be a pop star and do a couple shows before I start rehearsals. But once I start, it’s like in Avatar, I’m going to be plugged in, and then Norma will get all of me. But I’m scared because this is my Broadway debut, Lin. I’m 87 years old and I’ve never done Broadway. I can’t believe it.

MIRANDA: What I’m excited for on your behalf is, the Broadway community is not a cliche. It’s a real thing. It’s a little different from the West End. We’re all in the same eight blocks. You meet your heroes and find your people fast, because you’re all trying to get that bite at 12 o’clock for your 2 o’clock. The community is so real. I think you’re going to feel enormously supported. I went from being a substitute teacher to a Broadway composer and performer very quickly, and the best surprise was, “Oh, this really is a community.” I hope you feel embraced by that. I strongly suspect you will, and it’s life changing.

SCHERZINGER: I’m ready for my life to be changed because I want to lean into that community. I’m a bit of an introvert. Like I said, I’m Norma living in this tormented mind of mine. But when I came recently to do the Tonys, I felt that community, and I didn’t always have that in my life. I felt like people got me and they weren’t looking down at me like, “Who does she think she is?”

MIRANDA: The whole other thing, the weekly schedule, there’s a mutual level of respect of all of us being like, “Oh, god. Two o’clock,” and the joy and the pride in that. I remember an athlete came to see Hamilton and was like, “This is great, man. When’s your off season?” I was like, “Oh yeah, we don’t have that.”

SCHERZINGER: [Laughs]

MIRANDA: “When do you rest?” We don’t. Occasionally, Mandy Gonzalez, one of my best friends, will get to do the role and you’ll get to rest. But for the most part, you’re doing the week and there’s so much camaraderie in that.

SCHERZINGER: Yes, seven shows a week for over nine months.

MIRANDA: I find with theater more than anything else, if you scratch the surface of any performer, we’re really all just trying to recreate the feeling we had doing the school play. That first high of, “My parents are out there. We’ve been working so hard making this thing and now we get to do it together.” I feel so connected to that initial childhood impulse of play, in a way you don’t in any other art form.

SCHERZINGER: Exactly. I always say, “It’s not live theater. It’s alive theater.” I feel like playing Norma has been the greatest—I’ve saved so much money in therapy.

MIRANDA: A hundred percent.

SCHERZINGER: You’ve seen me play it. When you’re out there and facing your darkest demons head-on in front of everyone, you’re forced to evolve. You’re forced to say, “That’s bullshit. Those are lies. I won’t let you beat yourself up like that. I won’t let the fears swallow you under.” I think that’s going to be awesome for me, because I’m in a way more peaceful, settled, confident place.

MIRANDA: Yeah. I told people, being in Hamilton was the most relaxing part of my day. It’s the only time you have one job, and your job is to be present and focused and tell the truth. And Hamilton is not dissimilar. “I fight in a war, I have an affair, I lose a child.” Heavy shit, and you get to work it out and leave it all onstage. Because people go, “Aren’t you tired of saying the same thing over and over again?” No, it’s like yoga. The thing that was easy last week is kicking your ass this week and you don’t even know why, and you stretch and you breathe through it and you got another one tomorrow.

SCHERZINGER: I love that, yoga practice. I never thought of that. I pray a lot because Norma’s onstage for most of the time and a lot of times I’m not doing anything, so it’s easy to get distracted or sidetracked.

MIRANDA: The other thing I tell people is, you’d be amazed at how many other things can be happening in your brain once your body knows a show.

SCHERZINGER: “What are all the things that I want to eat after this?” But no, I’m not telling people that’s what I’m thinking. I am focused on that stage, Lin.

MIRANDA: No, you are focused and your body knows it. And then there’s a weird laughter in the fifth row, and you’re like, “Oh my goodness, what am I doing? What show is this?”

SCHERZINGER: But babe, I’m here for the weird laugher because he’s there. He’s present and I can hear him.

MIRANDA: Hundred percent. Well, I’m thrilled for audiences to meet you for the first time as Norma Desmond. I cannot stress how unready Broadway is.

SCHERZINGER: Oh, man. I’m going to do my bestest, Lin. I’m 46 years old. I feel like my entire life has been preparing me for this role and for this moment.

MIRANDA: Stay in touch with you about rehearsals and all of it. I’ll be here.

SCHERZINGER: Okay, lots of love and god bless. Bye.

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Hair: Eric Williams using Oribe.

Makeup: Grace Ahn using MAC Cosmetics at Day One.

Nails: Nori using Chanel Le Vernis at See Management.

Movement Direction: Sigrid Lauren at Streeters.

Digital Technician: Kilkwang Yoshi Park.

Photography Assistants: Mark Luebbers and Lauren Damaskinos.

Fashion Assistant: Willa Schwabsky.

Post-production: Hempstead May.

Location: Pearl Studios NYC.