I was battling cancer while starring on Broadway and no one knew (2024)

I went into rehearsal the next morning and didn’t tell anyone. Mostly because I was in denial. If I said it out loud, it would be true. That I have cancer. That I am rehearsing a Broadway show while being treated for cancer. Or maybe I thought someone would try and take my dream away from me. Or people might treat me differently. Best to keep it to myself until absolutely necessary, I thought. Besides, the stress of creating a new Broadway show was already so palpable in the room.

I found myself living a secret double life. In the early mornings I would meet with doctors, get blood work done and then run down the street to Broadway rehearsals, stashing my hospital bracelets along the way. Two weeks after my diagnoses, I secretly got a full hysterectomy, oophorectomy and cervix removal. Four days after that, I was on stage singing and dancing in full costumes and wigs like nothing had happened. (For the record, I do not recommend this.) I hid my scars with compression garments underneath my costumes, and I hid my pain too.

As an actor opening a new Broadway show, my job was to do things like learn a whole new set of lyrics a few hours before being expected to perform them flawlessly in front of a sold-out audience. As a secret cancer patient, I had to experience one of my first hot flashes alone on stage while 1,400 people watched. I would never know if the sensations I was feeling were just nerves, a side effect of a new medication, or both. I never knew if I was crying on stage because that’s what my character would do or because I was sad knowing I would lose my eyelashes and eyebrows soon.

Thankfully, two weeks into previews, the doctors called to say the pathology reports came back clean and I could perform on opening night. I was absolutely elated. Still, as my cast and crew looked for opening night outfits, I secretly looked for wigs and scarves in case I needed them. As people were telling their friends and family about this new Broadway show they were in, I was telling friends and family about what to expect in the next coming months. My colleagues met with stylists; I met with oncologists.

Opening night finally arrived. Minutes before the show was about to start, I finally found a moment to be by myself in my dressing room. I started to sob uncontrollably. I had been so focused on getting to this night, I don’t think I had ever fully allowed myself to acknowledge all I had been going through. But the show must go on. So I pulled myself together, put my costume on, circled up with my cast backstage for our pre-show ritual, and the curtains opened.

I walked to center stage at the end of Act 2 to sing my big solo. I was alone singing on a Broadway stage, just like I had always dreamed about. I’ve heard the journey of cancer described as incredibly lonely, and I’ve found that to be true. No matter how many people I have in my corner (and I have so many wonderful people), no matter how many people applaud for me or greet me at the stage door, no matter how many incredible cast members and crew surround me, this was ultimately something I had to do by myself.

And as I stood by myself on stage, just a spotlight on me and my secret hiding in plain sight, whatever I was feeling earlier melted away and was replaced with pride.

The next week, I told my cast the truth. In the months to come, I relied heavily on understudies until I took a leave of absence to finish out treatments. Drugs have thankfully come a long way in the past 10 years, and, while my experience wasn’t fun, it was not even close to what the women in my family had to go through. I even got to keep 50% of my hair.

I’m also comforted by the fact that soon I’ll be back on stage. And this time, I know I’ll be even stronger.