Alex Newell Looks Back on ‘Pippin’ 50th Anniversary Concert, Historic Tony Award Win and More (Exclusive)

When Broadway star Alex Newell won their first Tony Award, there was only one thing on their mind.

“I was extremely hot,” Newell, 32, told Us Weekly exclusively on Wednesday, March 19, while discussing Pippin’s 50th anniversary concert special, now streaming via BroadwayHD. “It was so warm in that theater. Like, I remember going outside and it was cooler outside than it was in the physical space. That’s why that was the first thing out of my mouth when I got up there because that’s all I could think about was how hot it [was].”

Newell took home the trophy for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical at the 2023 Tony Awards, which were held at the United Palace in New York City. At the beginning of their acceptance speech, Newell teased, “I’m not gonna hold y’all, because it’s hot in here.”

The excitement didn’t end there. “I also was supposed to go to the press room and never made it because my show [Shucked] was performing right after I won the Tony,” the actor — who previously starred as Unique Adams on Glee — recalled to Us. “So I was shoved to the bowels of the theater to take off all of my couture and put on my show costumes. And I could not stop sweating. It was a sticky mess.”

Newell made history at the awards show, becoming the first nonbinary performer to win their category. They starred as Lulu in Shucked, a pun-filled musical comedy centered on a small town’s love for corn.

Fellow Broadway star J. Harrison Ghee also broke new ground at the 2023 Tonys as the first nonbinary winner of Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical for Some Like It Hot. Newell is hopeful they won’t be the last.

“It’s truly just about willingly being able to adapt and not think about everything being so archaic and set in such hard, transfixed stereotypes and traditions,” the singer told Us when asked about the evolution of the Tony Awards. “I think every [ceremony] needs to really zoom out and start looking [at] how when they say representation matters, how they want to show that.”

Shucked played its final Broadway performance in January 2024, but Newell stayed booked and busy. In April 2024, they starred as Leading Player in the 50th anniversary concert production of Pippin in London’s West End.

“It was a labor of love,” Newell told Us, noting that they were working on the movie Another Simple Favor (the sequel to the Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick film) in Italy while rehearsing for the concert. “It’s funny, because I was supposed to play the Leading Player my junior year in high school. And I couldn’t because I was filming Glee … so it became a show that I really wanted to do.”

With music and lyrics by legendary composer Stephen Schwartz, the original Broadway production of Pippin ran for nearly 2,000 performances from 1972 to 1977. The show opened in London in 1973 — and hadn’t been seen on the West End since.

“[The excitement] was very palpable in the theater,” Newell recalled. “I think that’s what made it so special. Everyone was, like, hungry for it.”

Newell spoke with Schwartz about the project “briefly” and was given his “blessing” to have “free rein” on stage. Newell’s interpretation of Leading Player wasn’t entirely outside of the box, however.

“There’s no way of not honoring people that have come before you to play a role [in a revival]. And so there are makes and models of the role that are always there, that I think I leaned into, because it’s what’s expected out of the text, and what’s expected from an audience point of view,” they told Us. “And I think being a fan of musical theater, while doing musical theater, you get the special creative process where you get to honor the past and still make it what you want to do at the same time.”

The Pippin 50th anniversary concert premiered via BroadwayHD on March 13. Additional information regarding streaming options and subscriptions can be found on the platform’s website.