I have a wide spectrum, a wide demographic. I have the young girls, I have the gay community, I have many regular theatergoers. I do feel a tremendous responsibility and pride to be a role model for some of these young people.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I'm a role model for lots of young girls.
I was inadvertently raised in the 'gay community.' I had straight parents, but I spent massive amounts of time at a very early age with gay, theater-hopeful thirty-somethings.
I have five young children, and I take being a role model very seriously.
Thinking back on it, I've been in this business since I was 3, and I grew up in musical theater, so I was raised and surrounded by gay men and gay women. I was hardly around anyone straight.
I have a very diverse crowd from old, young, black, white, straight, gay. It's a little bit of everybody.
As the years went by, working on Broadway, I started seeing that I had a fan base and that they were mostly young girls. They are looking for someone that they can look up to, that they see as a role model. And I don't take that lightly; it's a big responsibility.
I get told a lot that I'm kind of carving my own path. That there are not many actors who are out and are able to play straight and gay, and everyone's OK with it.
I think I'm a different kind of role model for young girls.
In the past, it weighed on me because nobody in my family is gay. I had no role models so I had to find my own way.
I didn't have any role models. I really thought I was doomed to this loveless, lonely life. I didn't know any gay people until I began doing theater.