I accompany Laura Bell Bundy on a commute from rural New Jersey to New York City. Well, physically – we’re on the phone – but that makes me feel like I’m there.
“Sorry, I cried out to someone and gave them a finger,” Bundy says cheerfully as our conversation is temporarily interrupted by an explosion from her corner. Message there: Don’t get in her way.
Bundy has been out since her preteen years, winning a spot in New York’s “Radio City Christmas Spectacular” at the age of nine, and has since appeared on Off-Broadway in the world premiere of Canty “Russian.” 11-year-old musical – the role that led to nominations for the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards.
Broadway continued. She played Glinda in “Wicked,” and played two memorable roles. He decided on Elwoods for “Hairspray” Snooty Amber and Tony-nominated “Legally Blonde” stage adaptation. Along the way, there were TV and film roles (she was Becky from Robin’s “How I Meet Your Mother”), country albums, podcasts – and now she’s coming to Orlando for a one-night concert.
Bundy will perform at the Renaissance Theatre near Rock Haven Park in Orlando on March 3, then join “Hairspray” co-stars Marissa Jarrett Winocourt and Kelly Butler for the “Mama, I’m a Big Girl” concert in South Florida, where she continued her off-Broadway run months ago.
She says the Orlando Show combines all the experiences he’s had so far. “It’s cowboy boots and Broadway, but it’s a very gay-scattered place. It’s my happy place,” she laughs.
Bundy’s love of country music was nurtured by growing up in Lexington, Kentucky and later living in Nashville, Tennessee. With her husband and 5-year-old son, she lives on a farm in New Jersey, restoring an 18th-century barn (supporting messages from contractors during conversations. The insulation comes!).
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“There’s really something great about giving back to the land and making the land better,” she says of restoring the family’s 73-acre farm. “We have sheep and goats. We planted grapes for the winery.”
Expect country tunes on her show, including a hit cover by Dolly Parton and Shania Twain. But don’t worry, Broadway is given that deadline.
“Yes, of course, you’ll hear “legally blonde,” “woecious,” and “hairspray,” she says. “You’re going to hear from the shows I did.”
She is excited to combine different aspects of her career. “I don’t always have the opportunity to combine the world,” she says. As for “gay spraying,” she had a viral hit (over 3 million views) along with a chipper’s little ditty who said, “You can’t pray away from gays.” (“It’s played on every gay bar,” she says.
She celebrates her early role in “Ruthless!” To give her a strange, canky sense of humor. In a dark comedy created by Marvin Laird and his future husband Joel Paley, Bundy played a girl who doesn’t stop at anything to make it bigger in showbiz.
“I have the most habitual sensibility because I was essentially spoon-raised humor by two gay men,” she says. “I was really a gay guy trapped in John Bennett’s body.”
She tested her comic abilities in a 2023 production of Broadway’s “The Cottage.” Her co-stars included Eric “Will & Grace” McCormack and Alex “Saturday Night Live” Moffatt. The show was directed by “Seinfeld” fame Jason Alexander.
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“They’re all so great,” Bundy says. “It was hard to keep a straight face. I always went first. If anyone was going to laugh, it was me.”
Another early gig taught her the behind the scenes of comedy. For two years, Bundy played Mara Lewis, daughter of leading Lady Kim Zimmer, who won an Emmy Award for the soap opera “Guide Light.”
“I never knew if I was running along the line with Kim or just talking,” Bundy recalls when he overhears her colleague in the studio. “I realized that good acting means that other people can’t say you’re acting. She was so natural, so she was very human.”
During Soap’s tenure, “I was invited once, dated a member of the Mafia, was assaulted and suffered a breakdown,” she says. “There was nothing interesting about it, so I learned this other thing about riding the waves of emotions.”
She is confident that those early acting experiences led her straight to a Broadway breakthrough.
“The combination of campiness and learning to be vulnerable made me ‘legally blonde’,” she says. “I didn’t go to college for acting. I went to ‘Russia!’ and ‘Guided Light’. ”
She had a push-and-pull relationship with “legally blonde” for many years.
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“I loved ‘legally blonde’ when I did that. When Elle became a woman, I became a woman,” she says. “There were a lot of things we shared.”
But like many actors who have a breakout roll, she faced typecasts. “There was a part of me like, “I’m more than Elle Woods, everyone.” ”
But with a little distance, she created peace with it.
“I’ve come to a place where I completely cherish the experience of playing Elle,” she says. Especially because “I was part of a show that had a great message to women.”
This is important for Bundy, who co-founded the foundation supporting women’s rights and the podcast of Tomorrow. Her 2021 album, Women of Tomorrow, is designed to address the problems women face.
In fact, she heads out into town as she speaks for a work session to turn the album into a new musical. She and Tony-nominated director Christine Hanggie gathered “writer’s room” of women of various ages, races and backgrounds to develop the show.
“It takes forever to develop something for Broadway,” she says. It’s really exciting that it’s finally happening. ”
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Our conversation ended when Bundy arrived in midtown Manhattan.
That friendly and outgoing personality has always been a part of her, she says.
“I walked around New York as a kid, made eye contact with people, smiled at them and said hello,” she says. She then adds, in adult hindsight, “It was actually a bit stupid.”
But she is happy to carry that enthusiasm with her on stage.
“There’s definitely a lot of energy when I play. My show is bright and it’s so much fun,” she says. “I really don’t know how to hold it down.”
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Laura Bell Bundy
Content: Concert Broadway and TV Actors – Singer Location: Renaissance Theatre, Orlando at 415 E. Princeton Street: Door at 7:30pm Show Cost: $50-$60 Information: Rentiatre.com
