After Patti LuPone made some critical remarks about her fellow Broadway actors Audra McDonald and Kecia Lewis in a New Yorker article, it inspired a variety of responses from the theatre community. Now six-time Tony winner McDonald has weighed in.
In a CBS interview, interviewer Gayle King asked McDonald to respond to LuPone's comments. LuPone, in the New Yorker, said of McDonald: "She’s not a friend" and then adding that the two had a rift, which she declined to elaborate on. In that same article, LuPone was also asked what she thought of McDonald's performance in Gypsy (a show that LuPone had also starred in on Broadway and won a Tony for), and the former Madame Rose declined to answer the question.
In response to LuPone's comments, McDonald seemed unperturbed, saying: "If there is a rift between us, I don't know what it is. That's something you would have to ask Patti about. I haven't seen her in about 11 years just because we've been busy, just with life and stuff. So I don't know what rift she's talking about, but you'd have to ask her." McDonald's full CBS interview (to celebrate her history-making 11th Tony nomination for Gypsy) will air next week—though it speaks to how controversial LuPone's comments have been that the news outlet decided to tease the interview so early.
LuPone's comments have garnered passionate responses throughout the theatrical community, with everyone from Viola Davis to Donna Murphy weighing in—and the majority support Lewis and McDonald.
In the New Yorker article, LuPone also criticized Lewis, calling her a "bitch." That rift has played out in the public eye. Last year, LuPone was on Broadway in The Roommate, a show that shared a wall with Hell's Kitchen, where Lewis performed, and won a Tony for her work. There was a noise complaint, where the cast of The Roommate asked if the Hell's Kitchen sound design could be modified to minimize sound bleed. Then, a video of LuPone disparaging Hell's Kitchen for being loud made the rounds on social media. Lewis took to Instagram to ask for an apology from LuPone and said that calling a show with a majority Black cast loud was a "microaggression."
When asked about the incident in the New Yorker, LuPone took issue with Lewis calling herself a "veteran," saying, "Let’s find out how many Broadway shows Kecia Lewis has done, because she doesn’t know what the fuck she’s talking about...She’s done seven. I’ve done 31. Don’t call yourself a vet, bitch.” (Lewis has actually done 10 shows and LuPone has done 28 shows, though Lewis is younger than LuPone, having made her debut in the '80s). LuPone then added about the noise issue: “This is not unusual on Broadway. This happens all the time when walls are shared.”
Lewis has not responded to LuPone's remarks. Though after the New Yorker article was published on May 26, two days later, Lewis shared a video on her Instagram where she noted that a number of shows on Broadway are currently led by Black women: Gypsy, BOOP!, Purpose, and Hell's Kitchen (she also characterized Sunset Blvd. as a Black-led show—while Nicole Scherzinger is not Black, she's partly Asian and Hawaiian, her standby Rashidra Scott is). Remarked Lewis: "We're living in good times here on Broadway."
On May 29, Lewis posted a video to Instagram dated May 27 where she paid tribute to her father, John Henry Lewis, writing that May 27 was the anniversary of his death—and it was also the same day Lewis' Grammy Award arrived in the mail. "This is a lot," she says in the video. "This is a lot, this feels like him though, he’s like, let these [beep] know. John Henry Lewis, he didn’t play these games."
