Taylor Swift’s announcement of an album titled The Life of a Showgirl has shone a new spotlight on a profession that Broadway performers say blends visible glitz with ordinary, daily work.
Mikayla Renfrow, who plays Liz In Chicago at the Ambassador Theatre, told reporters that while the stage is “glamorous” and “glitzy,” it is also populated by people with routines, rehearsals and chores. “When people sit in the audience and they watch, it’s definitely a lot of glamour, especially ‘Chicago the Musical,’” Renfrow said. “But I would say it’s 50/50: It is glamorous, and it is glitzy, but there’s people behind it, and there’s humans behind it. I think that’s the fun part.”
Renfrow described a demanding schedule that differs from the one associated with pop stars. She said she typically wakes at 9 a.m., arrives at the theater two hours before showtime to stretch and rehearse, and performs six nights a week with double features on weekends; she and colleagues said the production often requires more rehearsal time because it frequently rotates the lead role of Roxie Hart. Renfrow said she can perform as many as eight shows a week.
The company is preparing to welcome Oscar-winning actress Mira Sorvino as a guest Roxie later this month, a change that has required extra practice. Renfrow noted that the pre-show ritual of makeup and costume is central to the work. “There’s like this magical part of the ritual of putting your face on to be in a show,” she said, recalling the scene in the film Burlesque when Cher helps Christina Aguilera with makeup. “I remember thinking to myself, ‘I hope that I have this taste of what it feels like, to put a face on every night and put your red lipstick on and this glamorous black eyeliner and put your sparkle fishnets on and you do this huge show.’ ”
Offstage, Renfrow said she tries to maintain ordinary habits: grocery shopping, meeting friends for coffee, spending time in the West Village, reading and eating oysters. “When the clock turns to 5 p.m., something in your body’s like, ‘All right, time to go to work,’ ” she said. After a performance, she described a low-key wind-down that often includes reading or television and going to bed around 1 a.m. Some nights, particularly when she has the following day off, she and castmates will go out dressed up, a contrast she called part of the double life.
Renfrow’s résumé includes Broadway credits in Aladdin and Wicked. She described herself as a Swift fan — the first song she learned on guitar was Swift’s 2010 single “Speak Now” — but said her life onstage is probably not as heightened as the pop singer’s forthcoming record may portray. Swift has described The Life of a Showgirl as reflecting an “exuberant and electric and vibrant” period of her life during the Eras Tour, when she performed 149 shows and began a relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. Swift’s new album is set for release in October.
Renfrow summed up the contrast between daytime and stage: “There’s definitely the 25% of our life that looks like that, where you put a fun little black dress on and … heels, and you get ready with the girls in the dressing room — moments where you’re like, ‘Wow, this is like the little life that I pictured with Cher and Christina Aguilera,’ ” she said. “It’s this double life sometimes. There are mornings where I’m reading ‘War and Peace,’ and then at night I’m putting on red lipstick. That’s what I love most: I can be a book nerd of the day and then a showgirl at night.”