Actress and singer Keke Palmer said she’ll be stepping into the title role in “Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella” starting Sept. 9 at the Broadway Theatre. She will become the first African American to play the part on the Great White Way.
“It’s honestly one of those things that I can’t believe is really happening,” Palmer said by phone Friday from her Los Angeles home.
Palmer, 20, is stepping into the sparkly shoes first worn by Tony-nominated Laura Osnes, then put on by “Call Me Maybe” Canadian pop star Carly Rae Jepsen and now worn by Paige Faure, who launches a national tour in the title role this fall.
Palmer, who will be making her professional stage debut, will rely on a host of skills she’s developed from film – including “Barbershop 2: Back in Business” and “Akeelah and the Bee” – her BET talk show, “Just Keke,” and on TV in Showtime’s “Masters of Sex.” Her albums include the 2007 CD “So Uncool” and a self-titled 2012 EP.
“One of Palmer’s heroines growing up was the singer and actress Brandy Norwood, who played Cinderella in a 1997 TV movie opposite Whitney Houston. “I feel like the reason I’m able to do this is definitely because Brandy did it on TV,” Palmer said.
Winning the role of Cinderella is the latest breakthrough for African Americans on Broadway, joining Norm Lewis as the first black man to play the title role on Broadway in “The Phantom of the Opera,” Nikki M. James playing Eponine in “Les Miserables,” James Monroe Iglehart as the manic Genie in “Aladdin” and Condola Rashad as Juliet opposite Orlando Bloom’s Romeo.
Hallstrom, Spielberg finally collaborate
Steven Spielberg asked Lasse Hallstrom to work with him more than a dozen years ago, but the Swedish filmmaker only recently accepted the invitation.
Hallstrom said he experienced “traumatic suffering” when he had to decline the chance to direct 2002’s “Catch Me If You Can,” which Spielberg went on to direct himself.
The trauma was finally resolved, Hallstrom said, when the two filmmakers joined forces on “The Hundred-Foot Journey,” which Hallstrom directed and Spielberg produced, along with Oprah Winfrey and TED Talks producer Juliet Blake.
“I’ve been admiring him for a very long time,” Hallstrom said of Spielberg, giddily noting the two are about the same age. (Hallstrom is 68, Spielberg is 67.)
“To work with him as a producer, that was heavenly,” Hallstrom said during a recent interview to promote the film. “To have him in the editing room for a couple days giving his ideas on it, and to have his comments on the dailies, (was) really helpful. And good ideas for the script, too.”
“The Hundred-Foot Journey” stars Helen Mirren as the prickly, prideful owner of a Michelin-rated French restaurant who bristles when an Indian family opens their own eatery across the street.
Stallone: It’s hard to get men to like you
Sylvester Stallone says action stars like him are “the hardest characters to sell” to other men.
“Men are very competitive,” Stallone said ahead of Monday’s world premiere of “The Expendables 3” in London.
“They go, ‘Who’s that? I’m sure he takes diuretic steroids. You know, he’s shorter than he looks.’”
The third installment of “The Expendables” sees the team battle a ruthless arms dealer played by Mel Gibson. Harrison Ford and Wesley Snipes join the cast of action legends. And there’s new blood, including “Twilight” heartthrob Kellan Lutz and mixed-martial arts fighter Ronda Rousey.
Gabaldon pleased with ‘Outlander’ adaptation
When she first saw raw scenes from the TV adaption of her “Outlander” book, Diana Gabaldon caught something. It was a line of dialogue she says her “fans consider iconic,” one they would miss.
The line, from 18th-century Scotsman Jamie Fraser to protagonist Claire Randall: “Ye need not be scairt of me. … Nor of anyone here, so long as I’m with ye.”
Gabaldon says she told producers, “No, you have to say that.” And they did.
The author of the 1991 best-selling romance novel about a time-traveling nurse . says to her surprise, the producers have “very kindly” taken her opinions into account “even though they’re under no legal compulsion to do so.”
