Interview with Audra McDonald
Thursday / October 1, 2026
About Audra McDonald
American actress and singer, born in Berlin and raised in Fresno, who has won six Tony Awards for roles including Carousel, Ragtime and Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill.
Source: Playbill on YouTube
These answers are taken from Playbill's 'My Life in the Theatre' featuring Audra McDonald on Playbill's YouTube channel. You! Backstage did not conduct this interview.
What do you enjoy most about singing?
110 in the Shade was the show where my father was killed in a plane crash, five days before we opened. We had to stop for a second so I could go home for the funeral. That was a tricky time, especially because Lizzie and her father have such a beautiful relationship in the show. What was actually kind of gorgeous for me is when I came back and did the show for the rest of the run, theater can heal, let's say, because I was able to sort of work through all my love for my father on stage every night. And John Cullum was so lovely and so open, and he kind of received all of that.
You kind of see your whole life, big moments in your life, based on what show you were in. It's so great when you play a character: you get to learn so much about the human psyche, about yourself, about others. I've said it before, I'll say it again. Theater heals.
What was a great moment for you as a singer?
I ended up winning a Tony for Carousel, which I was stunned by. I didn't know the Tony Awards schedule or anything about awards season. I was a newbie. Growing up in Fresno, one night you'd just turn on the TV and the Tonys were on. So as all this was happening, I was in catch-up mode, just saying, 'What is that?'
When the Tony Awards happened and I won, it was like I just floated right out of my body. All I remember is turning around and realizing I had to make a speech in front of all these people. I was so nervous. I was like, what am I going to say? I'm such a fan of everybody I'm looking at. And my eyes rested on Carol Channing, who was sitting really close in the front. She just had this big smile on her face, and I felt comforted by that. So I was able to make the speech mainly to Carol Channing. That was a moment for me and Carol Channing. I don't know if she knew it.
How did your career as a singer unfold?
The Secret Garden is the show where I made my Broadway debut. When I auditioned, I was auditioning to do the Broadway replacement, but they were also rehearsing the national tour. When I got cast, they said, 'Would you be willing to go on the road?' because the woman who was playing the role on the road had just had a baby and would really like to stay home. So when I thought I was going to make my Broadway debut, I ended up going out on the road. Then when I came back home, they said, 'Okay, now would you like to go to Broadway?' And so I did. I was still in Juilliard at the time, and a lot of the cast came to my graduation recital.
While I was back on the road, I got a call from my new agents to come in and audition for Carousel. That ended up being four or five, maybe even six times that I had to come back. Even though The Secret Garden was my debut, Carousel felt like the true beginning of my Broadway life.
What has been your greatest accomplishment as a singer?
Gavin Creel told me eight years ago, 'I think you should play this part.' The first day of rehearsal of Gypsy was the day that Gavin died. And I'm just so grateful that he put this idea in my head. Getting to work with George Wolfe again, being challenged in a way that I've never been challenged before, to play a role that is, I can't think of a role more iconic. And being given the freedom and permission by the estates to explore her in the way that is right for us, which is unapologetically a Black woman in that era. Just a gift.
I judged Rose too before playing her, and I don't anymore. I get why she did what she did. I see that it was out of love and protection and trauma. If I don't ever do another show again, I am so blessed and so fulfilled at having had the opportunity to play Rose. As I look back at all of these, I'm the luckiest chick I know.
Think about a demanding director, producer or music director. What made them difficult, and how did you work with them successfully?
Zoe Caldwell became one of the biggest mentors in my life, and she was brutally honest. She did everything big. She loved big. When she was angry, it was big. Being on stage with her was like being on stage with a hurricane force, and you have to keep up with it. When she didn't think I was doing it well, she told me. But when I got it right, when she got me to trust myself and not worry about whether the audience likes you or not, but tell her story, she was the first person to champion me. I don't think I'd be the performer that I am today if I hadn't met her. I named my daughter after Zoe Caldwell.
Kenny Leon pushes you like no director I've ever known. He pushes you hard, but he pushes you because he believes in you and he knows that you can do it. On days that I thought, I can't play this role, it's too iconic, I can't get there emotionally, he was like, 'Yeah, you can. We're going to do it again from the top.'
Of all the roles, songs and shows you have done, which is your favorite?
Gershwin's Porgy and Bess is a show that I'd always wanted to do. I'd always, always wanted to play this role, and it was one of the few musicals, operas, whatever you want to call it, that I would listen to all the time when I was at Juilliard, because it made me feel like, well, I don't want to sing opera, but if I did have to sing opera, this is what I would sing. So when I got the offer to be a part of this production, and knowing there was going to be Norm Lewis, I jumped at it, because he's like my brother.
To have the big orchestra and the incredible cast, and to get the opportunity to do it in Cambridge, to really figure out who we were in this iconic show before we brought it to Broadway, was a blessing. One of the most fulfilling things I've ever done. And to sing that score every night with those voices, those golden throats, was incredible.
Tell me about a song or a role that was hard to get right. What was it and why was it challenging?
I thought Lonnie Price was out of his freaking mind when he said, 'You should play Billie Holiday.' I was like, 'What are you smoking? I can't play Billie Holiday. I can't sing like her.' So we did one workshop and then another. I didn't want anybody to know I was working on this in case I didn't get it right, so they were very secretive workshops, way out of the way or way up high in the building, so no one could put their ear to the door and say, why does she sound like a mouse that's been stepped on? I was trying to figure out her voice.
With each workshop we got closer and closer, especially when Lonnie and I had the realization that her speaking voice was so much like my grandmother's. Once I figured out that Billie spoke like Nana, I was able to find her. I think I had passed judgment on her before, but getting to understand what she went through and survived made me come to love her and want to champion her.
Tell me something I may not know from reading your credits.
I got the role of Carrie Pipperidge in Carousel and fainted at my final callback. Yes, I fainted dead away after singing Mister Snow. I got to the last part and then I just decided that now's a good time to be unconscious. But they cast me anyway, so that's good.
In A Raisin in the Sun, Ruth makes eggs at the beginning. When we first started rehearsing, I started to pretend to make eggs, and it was very obvious that I'm not a cook. Felicia Rashad was watching on the side, and she went, 'Wait, hold it. Audra, girl, come here. Let me show you how to make eggs.' She gave me a little lesson, and that's one of the only things I'm good at now, because Felicia Rashad taught me. That's why Ruth Younger cooked such good eggs at the beginning of the show.
Audra McDonald's Full Biography
Audra McDonald was born on July 3, 1970 in Berlin, Germany as Audra Ann McDonald. She's an actress and singer, best known for her many roles on Broadway. Her mother was a university administrator and her father was a high school principal stationed in West Berlin with the U.S. Army. She has a younger sister and grew up in Fresno, California. She graduated from Theodore Roosevelt High School and went on to study classical singing at Julliard, from which she graduated in 1993. A year later, she won her first Tony Award for her role in Carousel. In 1998, she released her first solo album Way Back to Paradise. She was nominated for her first Emmy Award in 2001 for her role in Wit (2001). In 2006, she debuted as an opera singer in a production of a one-act opera La Voix humaine at the Houston Grand Opera. By 2014, she had won 6 Tonys, becoming the first person to win the award in all 4 acting categories. She planned to make her West End debut in 2016 but postponed it in order to go on maternity leave, eventually debuting at the Wyndham's Theater in the West End in June 2017. She has made many TV and movie appearances, most notably in 4 seasons of Private Practice (2007) & in Disney's remake of Beauty and the Beast (2017). She also performs at concerts throughout the U.S. She was married to Peter Donovan from 2000 to 2009, they have a daughter, Zoe Madeline. Since 2012 she's been married to Will Swenson, they have a daughter, Sally James.