Most people's Broadway debuts don't require them to fly 60 feet in the air. But The Lost Boys star LJ Benet isn't making a typical Broadway debut.
"I flew out to New York, did the audition, got a call the next day being like, 'You're going to do a fly test.' I had no idea what that meant," Benet recalled. "I guess I moved well enough to be able to book this. But it was terrifying at first.
"Now it's like, 'Okay, I'm just hanging here.' It's really funny how your body just gets used to the height, but at first it feels like you're playing God and you shouldn't be up there."
Numerous other Broadway rookies have probably battled similar nerves, even those whose feet stay firmly on the ground. But if there's one thing Benet has proven, he's game for any challenge. The 29-year-old started as a child actor who later pivoted to handyman work, employing trade skills his mom taught him growing up. It was right before starting a lucrative carpentry job that Lost Boys came calling — and he almost didn't accept — but now, he's the leading man in one of the most Tony Award-nominated shows of the season. Not to mention that he's met childhood idols like Mark Hamill and Billy Crystal.
"All that is Shoshana," Benet said of Shoshana Bean, who's Tony-nominated for playing his onstage mom. "She just knows everyone. It's so crazy; she brings people backstage and I'm just like, 'Hey, how's it going?'"
It’s a very different story for his Lost Boys character, world-weary teenager Michael, who feels misunderstood by his single mother and younger brother. Instead, he gravitates toward a misfit group of coastal rockers who turn out to be vampires. It's a dangerous connection, but a powerful and undeniable one not entirely unlike Benet's bond with his castmates, he explained.
“This being my Broadway debut, I've felt an insane amount of pressure in the weirdest times [...] at some points, it feels like the weight of the world on my shoulders.” Thank goodness, then, he is “surrounded by the best people who are encouraging me to just be me up there.”
In other words, Benet is soaring. In the latest installment of New York Theatre Guide's Broadway first-timers series, Benet shares his own journey from first-time Broadway-goer to Broadway star, as well as practical tips and recommendations for today's rookie theatregoers.
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What was the first Broadway show you ever saw?
The first Broadway show I ever saw was The Lion King in New York. I was 4, maybe, so I don't remember it at all. What I do remember is when I was 7 years old and I went to the movie theatres and I saw Phantom of the Opera.
It changed my life because I saw Gerard Butler and [The Lost Boys] executive producer Patrick Wilson sing, and it was like [...] "I can kind of sing, and they're acting, and this is really cool, and they're like singing really cool stuff, and I think this is something I could do."
My parents saw that, and I started singing stuff from the movie, and they started putting me into theatre camps. All the while, I was doing, like, eight sports at a time because my dad put me in baseball, basketball, soccer. My mom's like, "He needs to do theatre, too. He can sing." It was a battle of that, always.
Alice in Wonderland was my first-ever production, in Darby Elementary, and I played the White Rabbit. From there I got the bug.
Walk me through the day of your first Broadway performance. How were you feeling? How did you prepare?
I was honestly really calm, like, eerily calm. I didn't really understand what I was feeling, to be honest. We'd been rehearsing so much [...] so it felt a little insane.
The only time I felt emotional was right before we started, and I saw Shoshana backstage and I gave her a hug, and I just started crying. It felt like there was this release of weight I had been putting on myself for some reason, and she was there for me, and then we started the show and we did it.
What makes The Lost Boys a good show for a first-time Broadway-goer?
Oh my gosh, it's the perfect show to go see for your first time. There's so much spectacle. There's so much heart behind it. It has all the things that make Broadway, Broadway in one show. And it's a rock concert, too. It's not your classic Sondheim or Phantom of the Opera, but, in my opinion, it's cooler.
Things are moving on stage. There's holes in the floor. We're flying. There's motorcycles. It's all these things you would expect to see on TV. [...] Every time something cool is happening, people are always like, "We didn't know that was going to happen, or that could happen, in a theatre."
And it was the same thing with me: When [director] Michael Arden was explaining what the set's going to do — "Oh, hey, by the way, you're going to jump off a bridge when you start singing 'Belong to Someone,'" — it's like, "Oh, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. Didn't know that was going to happen or that was possible, but excited to see how I can jump off a bridge and be safe at the same time."
Throughout all the jobs you've had leading up to your Broadway debut, what did you learn that you're bringing to your work now?
I got a lot of the bones of acting [...] when I was a kid, doing Disney Channel when I was young. It taught me a lot about the industry. But there's a lot of pressure when you're a kid trying to work as an adult. You say yes to a lot of things that maybe in the moment you don't know how to say no to, so you go beyond that capacity that you have.
One of the reasons I took a break when I turned 18 was because I wasn't doing it for me anymore. I was doing it for everyone else who was feeding off what I was able to give. In that break that I took, I was able to find who I was and build from that. Who is LJ without acting? Who is LJ without singing? Who is LJ without the performer?
So, who is LJ?
Who is LJ? I found out I'm a lot more introverted than I was as a kid. I'm honestly really chill. It's so funny — we've had a lot of people come to see our show, and as a child, I was really more impressed by people who are famous. Now, after just doing life, hopefully I am seeing the human behind the performer because I found that for myself.
