Shoshana Bean is a Tony winner for tapping her maternal instinct in ‘The Lost Boys’

After two previous Tony nominations, the longtime Broadway favorite is getting her flowers for playing single mom Lucy Emerson in the movie-to-musical adaptation.

Accepting her Best Featured Actress in a Musical Tony Award for her performance in The Lost Boys, an ecstatic Shoshana Bean shouted out her stage family.

“It’s the most singular gift of my career,” she said. “I will never stop screaming about how special this combination of humans is.”

In the musical based on the 1987 movie, Bean plays Lucy Emerson, a single mom of two boys, who moves to a coastal California town overrun with vampires.

The role became hers when Caissie Levy, who’d originally been cast, left the production to stay in the role of Mother in Ragtime. Bean had recently played a single mother in Hell’s Kitchen and earned a Tony nod for that — and had said she wasn’t necessarily keen on reprising that sort of role.

Asked if she ever thinks about the "what ifs" if the role passed her by, Bean said no. “I've only marveled at what it is," she said. "I've only marveled that my dear friend, who's like a sister, would make a decision that, on like a soul level, was handing me a gift like this.

“Nothing on paper made it seem like this was the next right move, and something in my spirit moved me to say yes,” she added. “I'm so glad I said yes, I've never thought about what if I said no.”

She has thought a lot about working with LJ Benet and Benjamin Pajak, who play her sons. Forming the maternal bond with the actors has been truly “the best part of the show.”

Lucy wields a mix of tough and tender love, said Bean. “I’m not a mother myself,” she said. “I've just always had that sort of maternal instinct, and gratefully this time I landed in an experience with two boys who receive that, who want that.”

Get The Lost Boys tickets now.

Photo credit: Shoshana Bean in The Lost Boys on Broadway. (Photo by Matthew Murphy)