Show People with Paul Wontorek Derek Klena of ANASTASIA

He's already starred in fan favorite
shows like Wicked The Bridges of Madison County and his current gig as Dimitri in
Broadway's Anastasia. On his 26th birthday,
my guest today talks about balancing sports and show tunes as a team,
mastering the art of the shaky stage door selfie, and how a Aaron Tveit song
and a Facebook message from a famous stranger got him to New York City. So he
sent me a Facebook message basically being like, "So I heard you saying the
song. Did you sing a well? And I was like what? Like who is this guy? And you didn't know who he was? I didn't know he was, of course, like super naively I'm gonna sing
this song.

So I look it up, and I'm like, like I thought I was in big trouble. I
was like, "Oh no." Sit back and take a shot as Derek Klena kicks off a new season of
Show People Hello Mr. Klena! Hi, hey, how are you doing?
I'm good. It's so good to see you.

So good to see you, thanks for having me. How's life on the
Broadway? It's amazing, you know, Anastasia It's a beautiful show, beautiful
beautiful people coming. Crazy fans. Yeah.

And you're playing like that like a dream roll? Yeah. I mean this This like one of those people that you
like grew up dreaming about? Yeah this is like one of the animated movies that I
was always like, "Oh wouldn't that be cool if they made a stage production of it
someday?" Yeah, and you're engaged.  I am. A lot of
things are happening for you.

A lot, a lot, a lot happening. This is kind of like a peak moment in your
life. Yeah it's it's been like a crazy exciting year, and obviously an
exciting time. And, it's your birthday My birthday? Oh gosh.

It's not going to be your birthday when people watch this but today is your birthday. Today is my birthday. So we have a little gift little gift from from us. Oh, thank you.

Check that out. It's a little you know... Anastasia. Oh, there you
go! It's a classic, classic, classic.

Classic Russian vodka. Thank you guys. It is early in the day, but I would ask you if you wouldn't mind there's also something else on that bag.
Would you would you have a shot with me? All right. All right, let's do it.

Let's just kick it off. This might be the earliest shot I've
ever had. Yeah, me too, and this is the first interview I've done in a while
for Show People so I think we should kick it off and yeah I mean honor
of you and your many years. Wow, oh yeah, I shouldn't have I shouldn't
have topped it off should I? But, you know.

Cheers. Thank you so much.
Cheers to you. Happy Birthday, sir. Ah, yeah we did that.

It's real vodka. You did that It's really the real deal. Now since it says your birthday will there be other
drinking at some point? No, you know, the biggest thing the other thing I'm
looking forward to most tonight at Anastasia is we I get to wear the crown
jewels tonight. When you're the birthday boy or girl,
Marybeth who plays the beautiful Dowager Empress blesses you with
her crown jewels.

So I'll get to wear the crown and and the necklace tonight and
everyone will sing Happy Birthday, and we'll all celebrate over cake
pre-show. So I'm looking forward to that. I mean when you're on Broadway
you're in a schedule. Yes Yeah, so you can't really go crazy no I
mean you know guys in their 20s who may be they're celebrating a birthday.

Yeah, I got together with some friends this weekend we had like a
birthday dinner at like a hibachi restaurant. When's the
last time you did hibachi? Have you ever? It's been... I don't know. Okay it's I
haven't done it since probably like high school right and it's the best thing
ever Remind me what it's actually like.

You know they have those like those.. Like Benihana? They're at the table and they're flipping things and
you're cathing things in your mouth. You do this. But it's the most fun.

We have like
a small group of people and and yeah it was it was really fun. And what's
your fiancee, who probably was not your fiancee at that point... She was this was the day of. This dinner was planned to celebrate my birthday
and little did everyone know that we'd also be celebrating --And apple-picking
--Yeah, and apple picking.

--And avocado toast with bacon, which I
didn't know of. --It's it's more just avocado toast with bacon included, bacon on top and that's a must. And then like a drizzle of like ranch
dressing. And a ring? And a ring .

At what point did you decide that you would
propose with avocado toast? --It was earlier in the week when all this was
kind of coming to fruition. It didn't all come together in one week. --No, no I
mean I knew like we we celebrated our like eight years since we met this past
week. --So you met when you were a teenager? --I had celebrated my 18th
birthday a week after meeting her.

Wow. Wow. Which
is yeah which is crazy. So yeah, we've been together a long time.

We met at UCLA
and so it was So that's the first... It was zero week. It was like before we even started classes. I was going to say that's like the start of class.

Yeah, we moved in and friends from her
dorm were meeting up with friends from my dorm, just random people and we're like
let's go like meet people and like go to dinner. So we like we all went to the
sushi. --Marry them eventually? Exactly. --Who else
could say that? --No but we ended up sitting next to each other and like talking and we didn't actually start dating really until like like a couple months
later.

I mean we  were talking off and on like You must have been like woah she's gorgeous. I was definitely like this girl's special and eight years later and
now we're engaged it's yeah kind of hard to believe. So the avocado toast
it's just a regular thing you do? Do you make food for her often? --It's our go-to. We'll either do like like diced potatoes grilled with like bacon like onions,
like a big mishmash of all the stuff, or avocado toast, and I felt like that
symbolized us.

And you know we like cherish, you know the Broadway schedule.
She works on a regular schedule, she works in the fashion industry and so
we hardly ever see each other, so the times that we do get to see each other. So,  our special time I guess when we just sit and like actually get to
enjoy life together and is Saturday and Sunday mornings, so that it was a big
symbol of us and our happy time and I. Felt like it was appropriate.

It's so
sweet it's amazing that you found the right one so early I mean. I know. -- A lot of people must
say to you like really dude like this like you've been with her yeah now like
for all these formative years, and you've been like the toast, one of the
toasts of Broadway, I mean you had this amazing career happen you've had a lot
of attention, and and you've kind of had her by your side for that whole thing. Yeah she's been so supportive in the act the life of an actor is insane, and
so to have a functional relationship with an actor and someone who's not --She's not in the business.

She's not in the business. You know it's really hard and she moved out to
New York shortly after I did because I left during school after my junior year to
come out here for Carrie and then she actually graduated after her third year
at UCLA. -- Wow And was able to come out to New York to
pursue this this fashion Is she a genius? --She's really smart. --What's her favorite of your
performances? Oh gosh, this one probably.

Really? --She was a huge Anastasia fan
growing up, so when I got the audition and when I
actually got this and we were going to Hartford she was like, "I'm a little upset
that you're gonna be out of town for two and a half months, but if you're gonna
leave Anastasia is what I'll let you leave for." So, I was like thank you, that's nice,
so yeah  she was thrilled and she's seen the show. She saw it in
Hartford like three or four times. She's seen the show here three or four times and
every time we have new friends coming into town she sees it again and
Anastasia holds a special place in her heart. --Yeah, I think about that little
girl that watched that movie over and over now she gets to marry Demetri.

--Yeah. --It's crazy! Of course she's excited. Yeah, it's very cool. --Well, I'm very excited
for you.

Thank you. --We're gonna take a quick
break and be right back and we're going to talk about Anastasia. We're back with Mr. Derek Klenna, who
of course is Dimitri in Anastasia, dream role for you and your fiancee.


Yeah, definitely. We've been enjoying the Broadway.Com vlog Royal Misfits, Christy Altomare is
amazing backstage vlog. --She is, she's like the showrunner of it. I feel like
she comes in with like a storyboard every week and like a script and like
we all sit down at the table and we're all like alright let's just do a
read-through.

She's so prepared. --She's putting a lot of
pressure on the cast or is it a welcome , a welcome diversion? No, I
mean it's definitely a team effort all around because the thing with the vlogs
is like being the leading role in the show she's on stage the entire time,
so we don't really get like many times to to have those like
goof-off moments like backstage. We don't have a lot of backstage time so she has
to be very strategic about when all this gets planned and like when we're filming and
so the cast and everybody's had to like you know come in like 15 minutes, half
hour early to like you know calls it's like to film certain scenes. There's a special call for Royal Misfits? No seriously.--We have like a call, but everyone is super game.

--She also edits it, too. She edits it because like this episode that's coming out this week John and I
John and I did like a scene where we got into a big fight over like something
that I discovered with it.. Yes,  it's been brewing over
the course of the season yeah. The arc.

The climactic fight is finally here
that we've all been waiting for. So we literally, Christy's like perched
in like the corner of John's room as him and I are just getting to each other's
faces then we could end it like cut and like she's like you guys just moving a
little closer because they're not quite in frame and we're like okay we'll do it
again, we'll take it from that line, and then we get through halfway through the
scene and like one of us would start laughing. We'd be like alright just keep
rolling keep rolling keep going. We're gonna start over, so poor Christy's
sitting there going like in her head, "Oh my god.

I'm gonna have to edit this
together." And they're just chopping this whole scene up, but she's a trouper and
she has a vision obviously she has a vision, and
yeah we trust her. What I love about the vlogs is really you get a sense of how
fun is between the cast and sort of the backstage life of shows. This seems
like a very rich like a rich backstage, Anastasia. Yes and I think that that started even
during a rehearsal process.

I mean starting from the top Darko Tresnjak, our
director created this comfortable, positive environment that I think
everybody kind of fed off. And that translated to the writers and in
their writing process and to the cast. And yeah it's a great building,
everybody's, we're all really great friends and I think that's why the vlog
and the show honestly, the show has been successful. I think is I think a big
part is there's just a warmth in the building and and we are one big family,
which I feel like doesn't always happen on Broadway.

You know there's so much
stress that's involved and it's so physical maintaining a show for an
extended period of time, but we're all in this together and and it's uh yeah it's
a lot of really really good people. So what about the the Fan-astasias? As there
are many of them. And I haven't been in been in your dressing room, but
I've been in Christie's dressing room, and there's like there's art everywhere. I
mean it's wallpaper with you know.

We've all been in it in the vlog,
but we it's wallpapered with this fan stuff. With a fan mail, yeah. We do, we
have crazy fans. We have fans from the film we have new fans of the show,
fans of the story, fans of ours from like previous works, so there's just
everyone's like jointed together as like the Fan-atasia movement, it
grows so positive.

--Can they sometimes not breathe when they see you, because I saw the show, and I. Sat next to a young Japanese
girl who was just quietly gasping throughout the entire show, like she
would she was losing her mind like it was like she was in a virtual reality
game and not believing that this thing she dreamt of is coming to life in front
of her, so it seems like they might actually have a difficult time
communicating. --They do and it's it's funny: the selfie game gets like
super extreme. Everybody wants a selfie, so once one person starts
doing a selfie, everybody wants a selfie.

And we're more
than happy to like pose and yeah you know we appreciate them being --That's a
lot of selfies. -- It's a lot of selfies, but the best are the shaky selfies the
people that are so excited, so excited that we can't get a good one so every
once in a while there'll be a one of these, which is super sweet and they're
usually we'll help them out and be like alright, here we go
you'll get it, I'll tap it. I'll tap it You just hold, which is really sweet, but
there there is the occasional shaky selfie and we do get like overexcited
because people have waited years, years for this, and this coming
November is a 20th anniversary of the film. Oh my god what's gonna happen? We
going to do something? --What are we going to do? I honestly don't know what we're doing, but, we're probably going to do something.

Yeah, so it's a 20 years since the film came out, so all these people that have grown
up with it and waited all this time for its have finally come to be a Broadway
show is happening and it's exciting do things go wrong on stage? I mean you seem
like you have a really great poker face. I feel like you would really be able to
like keep things... You know who doesn't have a good poker face though
John Bolton. And he, when I see him starting to giggle, because he can be
like Jolly Vlad, and he's going to hate me for saying this but his role has a little more leeway
than mine does on the spectrum, but he's this is the best guy
ever, but lately you know we have enough inside jokes now that if something does
happen on stage, we really have to keep it together because we're like, "John, it's really great that we're such good friends, but this is a problem." Like
if one of us starts breaking, the other one knows it, and then it just...

So it
slowly starts to spiral. So there are moments when we definitely have to keep
it together. Lately the show has been pretty good, not like it's not like a ton
of mishaps. Every once in a while someone will just space out and start
to do choreo or like go somewhere that they're not supposed to go.

That
like was fun and interesting. We're like, "Oh, where are you today? Oh okay you can make that round?" Or like, you know, just the minute you start to think about blocking
and lines and all of that is when like problem like when you just get in your head
things. Like, now it's like it's just in your body and like you just let it
happen it'll happen so when you start to think about it, that's when things get interesting. Does anything go wrong with all the video?
There's a lot video.

Like, it's all video screens. Or, are they ever in the wrong country? -- It's usually, oh, this is actually kind of funny. The other day, because it's it's a
giant board of all these little mini squares, these LED squares that make up this giant screen. It's like a screen in Times Square, and...

--By the way, Frozen, same thing.
--Yeah, yeah, Aaron Rhyne. So, my mom and some family friends were at this
performance. -- I love your mom, by the way. --She's the best.

She's comes out all the
time, but there was one box in the middle of the screen in the back of the stage
towards the top that was like turning like blue and green in the middle
of this like Russian cloudy sky and it looked like there was like a UFO or
something was like coming through. So, John and I are on stage and we're in the
middle of "Rumor in St. Petersburg" and there's a point we're like we hubbub-
hubbub and we like move back up stage and we both look up, and were like, "The UFO's coming!" It looked like there was literally like a UFO that was coming
down into the scene. And my mom kept saying,
"Yeah the UFO would pop in
here and there," but it's usually, since it's a huge grid, it's usually like one
box here, one box there that will get finicky and then they can
reprogram it and then set it back up.

But for the most part it's
pretty incredible what Aaron and our production team has built with
that and what they're able to do with it. --It is beautiful. It would suck if like
there's somebody to hijacked it, and like Kardashian episode was playing on one of
those boxes. I mean, right, maybe that could happen.

--Someone just hacks in.
--Yeah, like some hack it in, yeah
--That's scary. -- I don't wanna think about that.
-- I don't think about that either. We're gonna take another break. We'll be right back with more Derek Klena.

Broadway's Come From Away is a Best
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takes you to a place you never want to leave.
Celebrate the best of humankind and the best in all of us at Come From Away, the
remarkable true story of the small town that welcomed the world. We're back with Derek Klena. Let's remind
people about your amazing resume.

You've had a really great few years.
--Thanks, yeah it's been a crazy... --So, I first loved you in Dogfight. --Thank You.
--Dogfight, Lindsay Mendez,
Pasek and Paul musical.

They're famous now.
--Yeah, they're struggling
--Yeah, yeah those guys, wow, and then of course you were Carrie.
--Yeah.
--And then you were in Wicked.

You were a Fiyero. --I was.
--Bridges of Madison County, and now
Anastasia. Now, what all these shows have in common is that they all have crazy
fan bases.


--Yeah.
--Right? I mean they every one of those shows has like...
--A unique fan base
--Yeah, and I can't figure out if you're lucky enough to end
up in great shows with fan bases or if shows get great fan bases because of
Derek Klena. This is, you know, this is the question.
--No. -- I mean you have a lot to live up to now.

It's like you can't just do some random show that like no one's
gonna like.
--Oh, gosh. You set the bar high for yourself. You can't just go.
-- In your own 26 years, I mean, you're a young guy. I mean, I've been super fortunate, yeah.

I mean Dogfight kind of just happened. I. Was I was lucky to be in the room with
some amazing people that I think...
--I love that show. --Made that show what it is.

Yeah, I mean
Joe Mantello, Benj and Justin, Peter Duchan wrote the book. Lindsay, of course,
and yeah it was a killer room. And then Wicked is Wicked.
--Wicked is wicked.
-- And then Bridges of Madison County has its own like...
--Oh my god
--cult following, obviously Jason Robert Brown Tony-winning score... --Do you listen to that album?
--I haven't listened to it in a long time because it's weird to listen to your own album.

And I listened to
it for so long. --Yeah,
-- But, I mean Steve Pasquale, he's one of my favorite voices in the world. He's just crazy, and the Kelly's like
stunning.
--O'Hara, she got her own performing arts center, how about that? She deserves that.
--She does deserve that.

She is Wonder Woman, yeah, and during
Bridges she had just given birth and she was like, had her newborn baby backstage,
and like she's a champion, and now this. I. Mean it's, I've been super lucky to be a
part of these crazy, crazy groups of people, but I think it's definitely the
shows, I don't think it's me.
-- So let's go back a little bit. So when I
saw Dogfight, I went to opening night.

I was lucky enough to be seated next
to your mother, which was very entertaining and I loved getting to know
your mom during Dofight it was great. She was
very excited.
--Very excited --A  big moment for you. So hi, mom! And I want to
go back a little bit to California where you grew up in like Orange County?
--West Covina --Okay, West Covina
--Now the city of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.

Everybody knows the city of West Covina from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. That is where I grew up. --That's so funny, right, okay so you clearly should have a role on this
--I know, and my mom's been like, "Do your agents know
that that's where you're from because you need to let them know that so they can get you
in the room." I was like "Mom, I'm sure.."
--You could put yourself on it. I don't know just an idea.

Just throwing it out there. I think your mom encouraged you, right, to
go into the theater? Did she, I mean she obviously drove you to the auditions. Where does that first start? What was your first, and I know you played sports and
we hear this story a lot.
--Yeah, my first...

--The guy has to choose between sports and singing
--Yeah it's very High School Musical
--We hear this.
--Early on, the first show I ever went to was Beauty and the Beast at the Shubert, in LA,
and so early on she exposed my siblings and me to the arts, and she
always had a love for it. So she got involved in that and then got us
involved in a children's theater that was happening in the area, and then
all these things started to happen as she noticed that we had a love for it, a
talent for it, and kept us involved. I. Started taking voice lessons when I was
like eight or nine years old.

I always had a really good ear, and that helped me
musically, and it's just.. What was the first song you sang on stage?
--I did Oliver when I was seven. --Wow.
--And that was the first big role for
me. --And you were Oliver.


-- I was Oliver, yeah.
-- Booked the lead right from start.  
--Booked the lead and I played the
coveted role of Tom of Warwick in in Camelot in Downey CLO so that
that started my regionals. The Southern California regional game for me.
-- And the crazy thing is you actually got your first big New York audition because of
Facebook, correct?
--Yeah
--Like we hear a lot of good and bad things about Facebook.
--Yeah my first my very first New York audition was actually for the non-equity tour of Spring Awakening.

It came down to me and Chris Wood, who ended up playing the role
on tour. So that was my big first New York audition that I sent to tape in
for, but the one that led to my first New York job was from Facebook.
--So, Aaron Tveit from was in Seattle, correct?
--Yes Singing Catch Me If You Can before it
came to Broadway, and he has this big 11 o'clock number "Goodbye," which he
nailed.
--Yes.
Huge song, Shaiman/Whitman song and you decided to...
--I had done a competition in LA
--You sang it onstage.

--Made it to the top five, and one of the,
I got to do my own shows being one of the top five finalists of the
competition, so I decided that I wanted to sing that song in my show. So my piano
accompanist, musical director was able to put an arrangement together of the song,
so I was able to do it. So the show ends up getting reviewed, and Marc Shaiman...
--So they mentioned in the review that you sang this song, and Marc Shamain  is probably like, "Wait a minute, there's no sheet music for this song."
--Yeah, and they're like who is this kid and why is he singing this song? --And they're like who's this kid? So, he sent me a Facebook message being
like, "So, I heard you sang this song. Did you sing it well?" And I was like, "What?
Like who is this guy?" --And, you didn't know he was? --I didn't know who he was, of course, like super naive.

I'm just gonna sing this song. So I look it up and I'm like, I thought I was
in big trouble. I was like, "Oh no. Is this illegal?" Is it illegal? --Illegally sang the song.

--But he was super nice, and he's like,
"That's awesome. Next time you sing it, just send me a recording because
we're gonna be looking for Aaron's standby when we transfer the show to
Broadway." So I was like... --Your head must have exploded at that point. --Yeah, I was like "What just
happened?" And then I actually got asked to sing the song again at a benefit in
Anaheim a month later.


-- And you filmed with like a five camera shoot with the proper
audio?
--No, no, yeah, it was all just just audio in a
recording studio, but the guys who were putting on the benefit
got the sheet music from Marc and they were like, "He wants you to send him an
mp3 like now, and I was like, "Okay." So I. Went to a friend's recording studio, put
down like a nice clean track, sent it off and that led to like a final callback
and work session for for Aaron's standby in Catch Me if You Can when I was
during my sophomore year of college. --And to casting directors and to all this stuff.
--Yeah, you know, of course it didn't work out but that was like my first big New York
edition, came in, did a dance call, a work session, two final callbacks, and you
know Telsey was like, "You know, this didn't work out, but there's a couple
other things we wanted to bring you in for, and one of which was Carrie. And so I
ended up sending it an audition for that, coming out for callbacks for the last
workshop of the show, did the workshop, flew back to school for
the last week of my sophomore year to do finals, found out a month later that I
got the offer for the off-Broadway run.

And then that was the big decision. I left school.
--And you always say, now I. Don't if you just say this to make your
mom happy, but you always say that you want to go and...Finish your studies.
-- I would love it to finish, not necessarily, I don't know if I'd be able to finish at UCLA.
--Right
--Like finish online or finish at a school out here, but I'd love to at some
point get my degree. I was studying psychology at the time and I feel like
if I wasn't to do theater anymore, or in acting in general, that I'd want to go
into like counseling or psychology that would be the career of choice.

So
I'd like to get my degree at some point.
--Yeah. I mean there's so
much ahead of you, and there's so many like you can think of dream
roles at every age.
-- Yeah, there's definitely a couple dream roles. I know
like Damn Yankees has been like kicking around for the next couple years so I would love
to do that at some point. I'd love to get more film and TV under my belt.
--Yeah!
--I've never done like a film.

--By the way, Unbreakable Kimmy Scmidt, that was fun.
--Super fun, yeah, after doing that, that's like my new life
goal is like a half-hour comedy. It's just the best environment, and of
course like that show's run by the best yeah. And that was just easy atmosphere,
everybody was just so happy, and the material is so funny.

That was definitely a highlight of like the TV experiences that I've had.
-- Awesome, well I'm excited for all of it. I love watching it all happen for you
and I can't see what's next. I can't wait to see the next 20, 30, 40, years of Derek
Klena, but right now just worry about like your wedding.
--Yeah
--Getting that going.

--Which will still be a ways out, yeah we're taking it slow. It's been
a busy year, but yeah we're very excited.
--And happy birthday!
--Thank you -- I'm so happy we got to see you on your birthday --Thank you. I'm so happy to be here on my
birthday.
--Awesome and I'm sure you'll look fabulous in Mary Beth Peil's drag whatever.
--Yes, yes, I can't wait, I can't wait to be graced with the necklace.
--Thank you so much.
--Thank you.

--Thank you for watching. We'll see you next time..