Sarah Jessica Parker has made a name for herself through iconic roles in TV and film, from Sex and the City and And Just Like That... to Hocus Pocus and The First Wives Club, as well as stage shows and performing on Broadway. Now, she's revealing the show she saw as a young girl that "completely changed [her] life" and sparked a passion to be on stage.
Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers sat down with the "true pop culture icon" on the July 16 episode of their Las Culturistas podcast for a lengthy conversation about everything from her life as a New Yorker to having to "up the shoe game" in real life to keep up with her SATC character and noted fashionista Carrie Bradshaw. During their chat, she revealed how seeing one of the first showings of A Chorus Line sparked a true desire to be on stage.
Parker recalled seeing a preview of the musical before it opened on Broadway while in New York City to audition for the 1976 revival of The Innocents, in which she made her Broadway debut, and the impact it immediately had on her.
"I can say without hesitation that it completely changed my life. I was like 9 or 10 years old and I was from Ohio, and I felt like the plates of the earth had just shifted," she said. "They were so good, that cast, and that show was so clearly about love. That show was so clearly about a dream... because it just says everything and it applies to people in a broad range of industries, but there is something uniquely special about this desire to be on stage. And it's hard to articulate because it's not necessary, it's not even rational."
A Chorus Line follows a group of hopefuls auditioning for a new Broadway show and the steps they take to ensure they get their big shot. As Yang described it, "It's about having a passion for a passion, it's about being passionate about passion."
"What I understood in the simplest terms was this kind of unmatched necessity to care, to be completely devoted, to flay yourself and with total understanding of the very possible disappointment and heartbreak," Parker said. "But that without the attempt, without the exercise, like the real endeavor, then you would be at a deficit. You would be worse off for not having been heartbroken than you would have been for a path more common."
On Las Culturistas, Rogers and Yang "get into the hottest pop-culture moments of the day" and even hang out with special guests like Amy Poehler, Chappell Roan, Lady Gaga, and Ariana Grande, to name a few. Check out more episodes of the Las Culturistas podcast at iHeart.com.